Jobs collided and fates entwine
by augustchick11
Summary: So Team leverage take on a job and unexpectedly cross a glitch in their plan. their glitch? Leola who is pulling the same job and then it continues... I suck at summaries sorry! Eliot/OC but other characters are around...CHAPTER 15 IS UP!
1. Chapter 1: colliding jobs

**This is my first Fanfic, so if you have any advice or criticsm or comments, please do review as it would help help me improve. Also I have a bad tendency to write things that dont make sense to other people so if that happens, let me know and I will fix/clarify/change the problem. Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: I own absolutely nothing of the show leverage; not even the characters. :( But I'm allowed to dream aren't I?**

**Chapter 1: Colliding jobs**

Walking up to the building, Leola took a deep breath and focused on her Russian accent. She hadn't used it in a while. Running her fingers through her black bob cut wig, she made sure it was in place and ran the job through her mind. She grinned; tonight was going to be fun. She took out her ID card and read the name Zaria Sidorov. She walked in and searched for the ambassador. He was a major part of her plan.

She gave a small grin as she narrowed in on her target. She spritzed her perfume and slowly walked past the ambassador of Russia. He turned around as planned and she saw the other woman give a glare. She smirked and picked up champagne.

"Excuse me." She heard the Ambassador say and walked over. She grinned pleased and turned around with a demure smile. Things were going as planned.

"Oh but ambassador, I thought you were going to treat me to a dance." Sophie trailed over, glaring at the woman the ambassador just walked over to.

Zaria gave Sophie a smile before walking away, her arm linked with the ambassador.

"_What the hell is going on?" _Nate's voice came through the earpiece.

Sophie huffed, _"I lost his attention. This never happens to me. Who the heck is the woman? She stole his attention" _Sophie picked up her glass and looked over at the woman talking to ambassador.

She grumbled as Nate still talked. _"This is not going as planned. I need you to grab his attention Sophie." _

Sophie rolled her eyes. _"You don't think I know that." _she skimmed the ball again, and saw Eliot. "_Oh I got it. Eliot, see the woman with the ambassador? I need you to charm the dress off her." _

Eliot moved closer and grinned. _"That won't be a problem."_ And began walking over.

"_I'm almost through. I need you to grab the card off him and scan it. That way I can open his safe. But you're gonna have to get him into the room somehow because the security is packed. There is no way to break into the room." _Hardison's voice came over.

Sophie nodded to herself. _"Will do." _

Zaria laughed at whatever the ambassador said, speaking in a Russian accent. "Oh you're so funny ambassador."

She put her hand on his arm and laughed again. The ambassador, was actually handsome, however he was not interesting. He pointed somewhere in the room and she rolled her eyes behind his back. She hoped to be out of there soon.

"You are very beautiful miss" he said smiling.

"Oh please, call me Zaria." She smiled, and squeezed his arm slightly. He looked down and nodded chuckling.

She took a sip and pretended to trip into him. His arms immediately went around her and she swiped the card. "Oh dear me, I think I have had too much."

She giggled moving back, turning sideways and putting the card in her purse, switching it for a fake. "Can you take my glass for a moment?" she asked and slipped the other card back in his jacket.

"You alright there miss Zaria." He asked, trying to charm her.

She giggled again and suddenly a man with long hair appeared.

"Hello, miss well aren't you beautiful looking tonight." She forced a smile on her face and thanked him. She REALLY wanted it over with. She turned to the ambassador. The lady he was speaking with before came up too.

"Hello there ambassador. I was wondering if you were ever coming back." Sophie teased, putting an arm in the ambassadors.

"Yes well I was having a charming talk with this wonderful girl" he answered giving a smile back.

Sophie slipped her hand in and grabbed the card, swiping it in the scanner and slipping it back. She smiled at the ambassador as he turned to the other girl who caught the attention of Eliot.

"May I have the honour of asking a dance of this lovely woman?" Eliot asked, giving her a charming smile. Zaria couldn't help but smile at him. He was quite sexy with his long hair brushed back, shining soft in the light.

"I am currently engaged in a conversation with the dear ambassador at the moment." She smiled, her eyes twinkling.

"Oh I'm sure one dance will be perfectly fine with the good ambassador." He gave her anther charming smile, taking a sip of his champagne.

Zaria declined his offer to dance again. He didn't seem to get the message as he still talked. What was up with these people, she wondered. They were pretty determined to get her away from the ambassador.

She narrowed her eyes at him slightly annoyed.

"Well do you think I could an interesting conversation with the lovely lady then?" he asked, not giving up.

She rolled her eyes at him. "No thanks, I don't want anything to do with you." He was getting on her nerves. She was going to have to do it the crude way. Turning away from the gentleman, she put a hand on the ambassador's chest.

"Is there somewhere we could have a little...privacy." she asked, giving him a knowing smile. The ambassador quickly agreed and excused the man and woman. She sighed relieved and asked him to show the way.

"_Who the hell is this woman?" _Eliot stood stunned. "What a bitch."

Sophie shook her head. "I told you. She is ruining the entire plan. Hardison is the safe open? We might need parker."

_Uh the card was a fake." _He sounded confused.

Nate's angry voice came on. "_What was this girl's name?" _

"Zaria I heard." Eliot muttered.

Sophie shrugged her shoulders. "She's very pretty; she's wearing a sparkly midnight blue dress and sliver strappy heels. She had black hair sort of into a bob cut. See if you can catch her on any of the cameras." Sophie felt kind of jealous, that Zaria managed to charm the ambassador better than she could. And that said something about Zaria.

"_Okay looking now. Oh I got one shot but she's not looking at the camera. I will run her face and see if a name comes up." Hardison voice replied. _

Nate joined in "_alright while he's doing that, Eliot, see if you can clear the hallway by the office and parker can try to break in—" _

"_I KNOW I CAN BREAK IN!" _Parker's voice yelled in. Sophie and Eliot winced.

"Jeez Parker lower your voice." Eliot grumbled.

"_Then don't underestimate my skills__." _Parker said pointedly. Eliot simply sighed, knowing there was no use arguing with her.

"_I'm not underestimating your skills, its juts part of another plan. Alright Eliot you're up."_ Nate spoke, sounding a little irritated.

Zaria walked slight tipsy and the guards nodded to the ambassador. He walked in, putting a hand on her back. "We are alone now darling." She gave a laugh and he leaned in to kiss her. She popped the top part of her ring exposing a small needle and poked him on the neck. His eyes widened and she groaned as she tried to catch him when he slumped. "You have to eat less Mr. Ambassador." She wheezed finally laying him on the floor. Now that he was out, she went over to the safe. Taking out the card, she swiped it and the safe opened to reveal a hundred thousand dollars and four exquisite diamonds.

"Hello my lovelies." She grinned dumping them into her purse and ran over to the laptop. Turning it on, she plugged her phone, downloading all the information on the drive. She put that phone in her purse and took out another out.

She plugged it in and it immediately uploaded the virus to the computer. She grinned again, shutting the computer down, throwing the phone out the window into the river below.

The ambassador groaned and she quickly closed the safe and ruffled the ambassador's hair. She unzipped her dress and slipped off one strap.

Sitting on the floor beside him, he woke up to what he thought her dressing back up. She turned as smiled as he blinked groggily.

"Thanks for the meeting." Her voice echoed and she zipped her dress back up. He stood up a little dazed. "What happened?" she looked very insulted and slapped him.

"I thought you were having a great time." She huffed and stomped out the door. The ambassador straightened himself up, thinking he just had amazing sex that he couldn't somehow remember and walked out the office too. The guards grinned and the ambassador went back to the ball.

Eliot walked down the hallway and saw four guards standing outside the office. Zaria walked passed him with a very pissed over look, fixing her hair and straightening her dress.

"I don't think things went well between Zaria and the ambassador." He muttered quietly into the earpiece.

Sophie's laugh came online. _"That's what she gets for putting out so much__." _

The ambassador walked by as well looking a little dazed and he stumbled, shaking his head like he just woke up. Eliot frowned, and walked back to the ball.

"_Something is wrong. He is confused." _Eliot spoke, keeping his eye on the ambassador.

"_Don't worry about him, just get inside the room." _Nate's voice came over.

Eliot nodded and walked back. "Hello, I am a little lost, mid telling me where the bathroom is?" he asked, giving the guards a smile. He knocked d the first guard and sidestepped a punch, answering with a blow to the head, knocking the second guy out. The other two guards dove at him and he simply bashed their heads together. "Well that was easy." He pulled the guards into office and walked in. "what now/"

Hardison's voice floated through the earpiece, _"Okay don't worry about the safe, I need the information of the computer and I should have the password soon enough for the safe. It can be opened electronically. Age of the geek baby."_

Eliot rolled his eyes at Hardison and went to the computer. He opened it up and turned it on.

The ambassador shook his head as Sophie tried to charm him. He was still reeling from what just happened in the office. Feeling suspicous, he walked away from Sophie without saying anything, walking to the office. With his guards nowhere to be seen, he pulled the silent alarm furious.

"Crap, he knows something is amiss." Sophie muttered. "I cannot seem to charm him. He is a wall to my efforts."

Nate answered _"Get the people out of there then. Pull the fire alarm." _

Sophie frowned "why do that?"

Hardison piped in. "_the people will distract him enough so that Eliot can slip away, oh and see if you can keep an eye on Zaria." _

Sophie looked around but didn't see Zaria. She pulled the alarm and sure enough people began to run to the exits as water rained down from the sprinklers.

Zaria froze as she heard the alarm. She walked directly back past the office into the back hallways. She needed another exit.

"What the hell is going on?" Eliot demanded.

"_Just pulled the alarm. You need to get out of there. I think we were made." _Nate's worried voice came over the com. _"this plan is going to pieces."_

_Hardison spoke up "Alright Eliot put the stick into the computer." _

Eliot frowned as a blank screen kept blinking. "Uh that might be harder than planned." He answered.

He heard Hardison huff. "_The little sticky thing goes in the little hole on the side of the computer." _He tried explaining.

Eliot growled. "I know where it goes, but it's a blank screen. Nothing is coming up."

He heard Nate curse and he felt like cursing himself. "_Alright then, get out of there. We are going to have to come up with a new plan." _

Eliot grabbed the stick and ran out the door to find six guards coming from the direction of the ball room. He casually turned the other way, picking up his step. "_Gotta go another way. Hardison find me another way if you can." _he muttered quietly.

"_Will do. Be careful." _Hardison replied.

Suddenly he saw Zaria turn into the hallway on the left. He quickened his pace. "Hey I found Zaria."

"_Ok see if you can stay with her. We need to know if she had anything to do with this." _Nate replied, hoping to find out what this Zaria was up to.

"Copy that." Eliot agreed. "Hey!" he shouted as he turned into the hallway. She turned around, and then took off running. Eliot sighed annoyed and took off running too. "Hey Zaria!" he shouted but she ignored him. He heard guards behind them as he closed in on Zaria and looked behind him. He looked back to Zaria to find her not there. He frowned looking into the hallways on the left and right but there was no sight of her. "Damn I lost her." he was surprised. This woman knew what she was doing.

Suddenly guards poured out of the hallway and he found himself surrounded. "_Uh gonna be while." _He said, giving the guards a quick smile. He heard Nate mutter but paid no attention. He frowned and his eyes flashed as he saw he was completely surround by at least fifteen guards.

He ran at one, delivering a swift punch to the stomach, flipping a guy over him and drop kicking the next guy. He whipped his wet hair out of his face and ducked a punch, sidestepping a kick, grabbing the guy's foot and flipping him into three more guys. His face hardened as he realized the reality of the situation.

Zaria saw the man with the long hair chasing her and freaked. "Goodang the lovely chocolate." She muttered and took to running. When he looked behind him, she jumped up to the ceiling, grabbing the pipe and pulling herself up. She threw her purse on her back and held herself in place.

He stopped just under her and she heard him mutter "Damn I lost her." she cocked her head to the side, studying him. He must have an earpiece in his ear. She watched as the guards came up and surrounded him. He fought and put at least five guys she could count down while the rest swarmed. She stayed in position and nearly yelled a warning when one of the guards came up from behind the man and tasered him. He convulsed as the current shocked his body and sank to the floor. He looked up, and saw her, causing her to hold her breath, her heartbeat went wild and she pleaded with her eyes not to give her position away. One of the guards slugged him in the face and he gave her a bloodied smile before being tasered. He fell to the floor with a thud and they dragged him away.

She sighed relieved, a little shaky. She waited a few more minutes before lowering herself. The sprinklers finally stopped and quietly began towards what she hoped was an exit.

"He's still in there." Sophie spoke worriedly. The hitter has been in tough situations but he was always able to get himself out. That was what he did; get everyone out of tough situations. He would be fine, Sophie tried to assure herself but it didn't seem to be working. On top of it all, this Zaria woman was nowhere to be found.

There was a groan that sounded like Eliot and Nate was trying to get Eliot to answer.

"_Eliot. ELIOT!" _but there was no answer. "_Damn. Alright Sophie you need to get back here and I need to devise a plan."_

Sophie began walking to her car, and felt her stomach flip. Those guards didn't really look so friendly. She tried assuring herself again, taking a deep breath.

"_Alright they have the building on lockdown but I cannot pinpoint the location of Eliot. I should have it by the time Sophie gets here." _Hardison said sounding a little worried as well.

"_I will get my rope." _Parker insisted. "_We gotta get him. Our hitter needs a hitter. That's funny."_ Parker burst out laughing. "_So weird. The hitter needs a hitter because he is being hit on and he needs someone to hit the hitter hitting him who is our hitter." _

Sophie laughed and shook her head. Parker was so strange sometimes.

"_That didn't even make sense dude." _Hardison retorted and parker snorted, still laughing.

"_But I'm serious. We need to save our hitter."_ Parker insisted, her voice suddenly serious.

Nate didn't say anything to Parker and Sophie hoped it was because he was coming up with a plan.

Eliot woke up and groaned quietly, his vision hazy. The last thing he remembered thinking was the bitchy Zaria, hiding on the ceiling. He blinked it away to find the ambassador in front of him. He went to move his hands, finding them behind his back, in handcuffs. Same with his feet. He sighed quietly and watched the ambassador pace angrily, trying to gage the situation. He had to admit to himself, it really did not look that good.

"Do you know what you have done!" he screamed with a heavy accent.

Eliot was confused but he kept the emotion off his face.

"That move cost me my company, billions of dollars!" the ambassador snarled.

Now very confused, Eliot frowned. He had no idea what the ambassador was talking about but he could only guess that it had something to do with what Zaria took. His frown made the ambassador even angrier and two guards slugged him in the face, and in the ribs. Eliot groaned and wheezed as the air exploded out of him. He tried to inhale and squeezed his eyes shut against the pain. One of the guards grabbed his hair, yanking his head up.

"I want the memory drive and my money. Not to mention the diamonds." The ambassador spoke.

Eliot wheezed, "I don't have anything." Earning him another punch. It was going to be a long night.

Zaria walked by a couple rooms and finally found an exit. Looking down the balcony to see the river, she shuddered. She really didn't like heights but it would have to do. She stepped on the railing to jump when she heard a yell and a groan. Hesitating as she instantly knew who it was and she turned around looking down the hallway biting her lip. That man helped her and she should help him back but she was a thief after all.

'Ah but you are also good. You help those who help you.' Her brain rationalized. She really hated her brain at times, trying to make good of every situation.

She groaned frustrated knowing that she needed to help him. He was a gentlemen and not to mention cute. Sighing, she reached into her purse; she pulled out her gun with darts. The darts were filled with a sleep concoction which would knock out the guards instantly.

She sighed, muttering to herself. "I can't believe I'm doing this again. Don't I remember what happened last time? Of course I do but that doesn't stop me. No lets go head on into danger to save someone you don't even know." she sighed, knowing she was crazy for saying everything out loud.

It never did any good. She always felt guilty and had to do the right thing. Grumbling to herself, she hid her purse by the balcony and slipped down the hallway.

The shouts grew louder and a guard came out. Slightly panicking, she surprised him, punching him in the face, kicking his knee out, covering his mouth muffling the scream and knocked him out. Slightly amazed at herself and frazzled, she tried to think what to do next. She instantly thought pockets, maybe guns. She ran through his pockets hopeful and found a taser. She rolled her eyes at the guy and walked quietly into the room. It was full of boxes and the man with the long hair was handcuffed to the chair. The ambassador was screaming at him and another was at a computer. Two guards were beating the handcuffed man.

"There is nothing on this drive. It's empty." The computer guy announced. The ambassador turned around furious.

"Give me your gun." He ordered. Eliot's eyes widened as he struggled against the cuffs. He looked into the barrel as the ambassador cocked it.

Suddenly the guard beside him went down, a dart in his neck. He whipped his head around to see Zaria walk out from behind the boxes and shoot the other guy. He was never happier in his life to see Zaria. He tensed as the ambassador turned the gun on her and fired. She ducked, tumbling behind the table. She flipped it and cursed. This is definitely not a place she wanted to be.

The computer guy went to run out but she tripped him, shooting a dart into his back.

"Darn it to the pancakes that are terribly made." She yelled angrily.

Eliot frowned. He must have hit his head hard if she was talking about pancakes in the middle of a gunfight.

The ambassador hesitated and stopped firing. "Zaria?" he asked.

She sighed and hid the taser on the strap on her thigh. Never knew when she need strap things. Slowly she walked out from the table.

"Hello Mr. Ambassador." She spoke in a heavy Russian accent.

"You behind this?" he asked furious, the gun still pointed at her.

She laughed and dropped her hands to her side. "Why on earth would I be involved? I do what is good for my country." She slowly walked closer, a smirk on her face. "What side are you on Mr. Ambassador?"

The ambassador stared at her for a moment and smiled. "Same one. This son of a bitch stole my drive and money. I need it back." Pointing the gun back at Eliot.

Eliot inhaled sharply, looking hard at Zaria. He didn't know what was going on. She smiled coldly at him and went to the computer. She picked up the memory stick and tossed it.

Eliot saw the cold look but he saw her eyes as well and He was somewhat relieved. Her face was cold but her eyes were warm and concerned so he put his focus on the ambassador, hoping that Zaria had some sort of plan.

"What if I told you, I could retrieve it back for you Mr. Ambassador?" he still had the gun trained on the handcuffed man. Her stomach clenched as she saw blood run down his face but forced the smile on her face.

"You can do that can you?" he smiled. "That would be great. Then we don't need this dirt bag." And he went to shoot.

She grabbed the gun turned it to the floor. A shot went off and missed Eliot by a few inches. She grabbed her taser, kicking the ambassador back and hit him with the highest shock it could. He wheezed teeth clenched tight, eyes bulging.

"That's what you get for stealing money from the people." She spoke with such venom; it sent a chill down Eliot's spine. The ambassador let out a groan and fell to the floor smashing his head hard. Zaria simply ignored that fact and walked over his unconscious body.

"_Eliot you there? Eliot are you all right`" _Nate's frantic voice came through the earpiece and Eliot winced at how loud his voice revertabrated through his brain.

"Uh I don't know." He said, raising a cautuois eyebrow at Zaria. She turned around without looking at him and took out a bobby pin. She got the handcuffs off in record time and froze when loud footsteps of the guards could be heard. She felt herself panicking again.

"we got get out of here darling'" Eliot said. She nodded, helping him up. He groaned quietly as he swayed a bit, putting a hand to his head. She put her hands on his arms and steadied him. Looking into his eyes, she saw that he was dizzy.

"We have to go." She whispered, concerned about the blows he had taken to the head. Eliot just nodded. They ran and she took his arm, pointing to the balcony.

"What we gonna jump?" he asked incredously.

She gave him dirty look, "it was the only exit I found in a hurry. You and that other woman ruined my plans." She grumbled, still with a Russian accent. There was yelling from down the hallway and she grabbed her purse, sealing it tight. She saw him noticed and explained "not my first time jumping into the river. I learned to have the inside of my purses to seal like zip lock bag." He nodded, surprised of how thoughtful that was. "Will you be alright?" she asked concerned.

Eliot smiled, getting a questionable look from her. "Oh I just thought of you as a crazy bitch." He immediately regretted saying that as she looked very insulted but she suddenly gave a crazy grin.

Grabbing his hand and stepping on the railing, she spoke, "first impressions never mean a thing my lovely."

Laughing she jumped off, pulling Eliot with her.

**Do you like it? Should I continue? Please R and R! All reviews are much appreciated!**


	2. Chapter 2: Meeting the team

**Hi! I just recently started watching Leverage and absolutely fell in love with the show so please bear with me as I go through the seasons. :)**

**Enjoy and please R&R!**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing; the characters and the show leverage except for Leola. She is mine :)**

Eliot smiled, getting a questionable look from her. "Oh I just thought of you as a crazy bitch." He immediately regretted saying that as she looked very insulted but she suddenly gave a crazy grin.

Grabbing his hand and stepping on the railing, she spoke, "first impressions never mean a thing my lovely."

Laughing she jumped off, pulling Eliot with her.

**Chapter 2: Meeting the team**

She braced for the frigid temperature of the water but it still did no good. Her breath exploded out of her as the water enclosed her in a cold embrace. Swimming up to the surface, she saw Eliot shudder in the freezing water and grinned.

"What are you grinning for?" he asked, swimming for the shore. He did not appreciate her jumping off the balcony without giving him a bit of warning.

She laughed at him, finding it hilarious of how grumpy he really was. She guessed he had his reasons, since after all tonight didn't go so well for him.

"Nothing you just look like you are enjoying your swim." She teased, causing him to scowl.

They walked out of the water and she couldn't stop shaking. Jumping into the river definitely wasn't a smart plan. Eliot's expression told her she was right.

"My car is over here." She grabbed his arm leading him over to the black Mercedes.

Eliot's eyebrows shot up impressed as he looked over the car. Grinning she got in and turned the air on full blast, welcoming the hot air, hoping to stop shivering sometime soon.

Eliot got into the passenger seat and flipped his hair back, relieved to find the car warming up. He rubbed his hands together and put them in front of the heater. She watched him slightly amused and he scowled. She chuckled and put the car in gear.

She pulled to the side of a road once they were in the clear and Eliot looked at her confused. She turned off the car and turned around to face him, watching him with a serious thought. He frowned and scowled making her grin as she reached into the back and pulled out a mini first aid kit.

Grabbing a towel, she reached over to wipe the blood oozing down his face and he moved his face out of the way. She frowned and tried again. He moved back again, giving her a glare.

Suddenly she was on his lap, her legs on the outside of his, gently pressing the towel to his head with ease. He didn't even have time to react. He cleared his throat and put his hands on her legs. He had nowhere else to put them. That wasn't the only problem, Eliot could feel her moving around on top of him and though it was awkward and embarrassing, there was nothing he could do.

He had a feeling she was the type of person not to be denied, if she was right then was no arguing with her. So in attempt to keep his wits about him he looked anywhere else but at her. But in one moment his eyes locked with hers, looking into her eyes, he realized they were hazel green and smiled.

Wincing when she wiped the blood away from his temple but at that particular moment pain was good. Pain reminded him what was going on.

"Sorry" she whispered moving the towel more gently across his brow.

"Its okay" he said noticing how the dress showed off the curves of her body. His eyes looked over her and landed on her chest. Quickly he looked away hoping she didn't notice that he was just staring at her breasts. As he moved the pain in his chest yelled at him to stop, perhaps he was hurt more than he knew. Leola heard low groan under Eliot's breath, she raised her eyebrows giving him a funny look. Leaning back a bit to look into his eyes, she stared at him until he found himself in a staring contest.

Eliot groaned again and noticed the funny look she was giving him now. "What?"

"Take off your shirt." She said casually, picking at his shirt and Eliot's eyebrows shot up.

She frowned, confused at his reaction and backtracked, suddenly realizing what he thought.

"Oh I mean so I can check your ribs." She blushed embarrassed, scolding herself for not thinking about what she had said.

"Uh no thanks darling', I can wait until I get home. They aren't bad, I already checked them." He gave her a smile, noticing she looked cute when she blushed.

"Ok, then are they cracked?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. Eliot sighed impatiently but she stared him down. He swore it was like dealing with Parker.

"Only two are cracked, happy?" he asked sarcastically, getting a smile from her. She crossed her arms and smiled back sweetly.

"Well then take off your darn shirt and let me wrap them." He gave her a death glare but she ignored it. "Might as well do it now, lessens the chance of injuring yourself more." She pointed out and he groaned.

His head hurt, he was cold, wet and irritated. So naturally he gave in, to the girl sitting on his lap, ordering him to take his shirt off. Rolling his eyes, he let her help him lift his shirt, her eyes soaking in the muscular chest and abs, appreciating her view. She grinned but took to looking at his ribs. Closely.

He cleared his throat, a little uncomfortable as she bent down, her head at his chest. Giving him a weird look she took some wrapping, jostling his arm whenever it was in the way. He cleared his throat again.

"Why are you clearing your throat?" she asked frustrated as she finished wrapping.

"Because you're in my personal space." He retorted, glaring at her.

"What the hell are you talking about?" she asked confused. He was acting like he was being interrogated.

He lifted his hands and gestured to his lap. Frowning she followed to realize she was sitting on him; she gasped in surprised and laughed.

"Well isn't this something. My bad, I can move, I'm done anyways."

But she slyly put a hand on Eliot's chest and leaned so that she was inches away from him. He froze, not knowing what exactly she was doing when he felt her breath on his cheek.

"Too bad, this could have been fun." She whispered a smile on her face. Before he could have a chance to say something, she slipped back over to her side.

He relaxed into the seat, wincing as his sore muscles screamed at him

"By the way what is your name?" she asked suddenly looking at him again. "I should have asked that first but I tend to do things a little backwards sometimes."

He stared at her for a moment, wondering what goes through her head sometimes before answering gruffly. "Eliot. And you're Zaria?"

She snorted. "No that was my cover. Leola at your service." She stuck out her hand and smiled, eyes twinkling. He shook her hand and eyed the black wig. "Not your really hair?"

She took it off, answering his question and shook her head, her dark reddish brown curly hair falling around her and framed her face. He nodded, as if he suspected that.

"So where to?" she asked turning on the car.

"I need to go back to my team. And I need you to come with me. You ruined our job and we need to sort this out."

She smacked him in the arm. "That was my job, I was there first. Besides I'm the one who succeeded." Sticking her tongue out at him.

"I don't care who or what, you just have to come until its sorted out." he growled.

She shook her head side to side as if contemplating something then nodded. "Sounds good." She spoke putting the car in gear.

"But first, tacos!" Stomping her foot on the gas, the car screeched forward and Eliot groaned as his head flew back into the seat. She laughed wildly and he quickly threw on his seatbelt. She might not so bitchy but he definitely decided she was crazy.

"Come on come on come on!" Parker insisted, almost jumping up and down on the couch. "We need to get Eliot back"

"I know that Parker but it's not that simple." Nate turned around irritated. "I'm trying to think here, but it's not really working with you nagging on me."

Nate immediately regretted what he said as Parker's face fell and then soon became guarded. Without a word she walked out of the room and he found Sophie just glaring at him. He threw his hands up in surrender and Hardison was mumbling in the background

"Not good, ok this way no good, nope that isn't either; how the heck did we infiltrate this place anyway."

Nate exhaled heavily and looked down at his drink. He has failed Eliot. He was going to fail the team. Maybe it was tim-

"ELIOT!" Parker screeched and Nate ran into the front of the office. Sure enough a very irritated, wet scowling Eliot nearly got knocked over by the force of Parker.

"Jeez Parker come on, got some cracked ribs here." He mumbled, wincing as she accidentally pressed on them.

Then she started poking him. Smacking her hand away, glaring at her playful face, he walked straight to the kitchen and grabbed an icepack, putting it against his head, sighing as the cold helped ease the pain.

"HEY ELIOT!" Hardison smiled. "Just coming to get you. Speaking of which, how'd you get out?"

Eliot went to answer when Sophie's loud voice was heard in the next room. Nodding, he pointed silently to the front of the office.

"And who are you?" asked, eyeing the midnight blue dress she spied earlier tonight. "Zaria, if I am correct?" speaking with a less nicer tone than usual.

Leola simply grinned and asked "Bathroom?"

Raising an eyebrow, she pointed the way and Leola nodded, spying a blonde girl zip around the corner.

Sophie turned around to burn a hole in Eliot and he began to protest. "Hey she was the one who did our job; I figured Nate would want to talk to her."

Nate turned around agreeing with Eliot. "That money was for our client. We need to see if she will give it to us."

Hardison snorted. "Good luck with that." And Parker came in, sat down on the stool when Leola walked in. she was wearing dark faded jeans and a loose cardigan, her hair let down around her face and the makeup cleaned off. Eliot glanced at her and studied her as she put a taco bell bag on the kitchen table and went over to sit down on the couch, crossed legged with her knee slightly bouncing.

Everyone eyed the taco bag suspiciously and Leola rolled her eyes. Walking back over she grabbed two, leaning against the counter and took a big bite. Satisfied that they weren't poisonous, Hardison grabbed one too and took a big bite and nodded in pleasure.

"Oh before I forget." Leola set her taco down and took out a penlight, walking over to Eliot. She shined the light in his eyes and he scowled, trying to smack her hands away.

"Cut it out, I'm fine." He mumbled, giving her a dirty look and she gave one back.

"Just making sure Eliot, you never know."

She put the penlight in her pocket. "Now deep breath." She ordered.

Nate watched amused as Eliot got bossed around by this girl. She was slender though not as small as Parker. She was definitely athletic and she moved with prowess and confidence.

He heard Eliot give a sarcastic breath but it must have passed the test as Leola walked over to finish her tacos.

"So, who are you guys?" she asked, taking a big bite.

"I'm Nate Ford and this is Sophie in the corner." Sophie gave her a displeased smile making Leola frown slightly. She didn't know what she did to cause Sophie to dislike her so much.

"And I'm Hardison, the hacker." Hardison spoke raising a taco to her. "Thanks for these. But why so many." He asked, eyeing the fifteen tacos left in the bag.

Leola shrugged and grinned. "I didn't know how many were on this team of yours and Eliot wasn't in much of a talking mood." Glancing over at him, and he rolled his eyes and she gave him a grin from ear to ear.

"I was trying to survive that crazy driving you were doing. You nearly clipped three cars! Not one, not two but three." He said holding up three fingers for emphasis.

She shook her head at him and smiled.

"I was hungry and if people knew how to drive I wouldn't have nearly clipped them." she murmured, walking over to Eliot and covered his hand holding the icepack with hers and gently moved the icepack from his forehead to his eye.

Hardison laughed and Nate felt himself be amused too.

"And who's the Blondie?" she asked, nodding her head at Parker.

Parker eyed her suspiciously from the top of the couch near Eliot before saying curtly, "Parker."

"Ah nice to meet you all." She smiled and threw her wrappings in the garbage.

Parker continued to follow her every move with weird narrowed eyes so Leola gave her weird eyes back, following Parker.

She grabbed two tacos and handed them to her. Parker didn't take her eyes off Leola as she accepted them, sniffed them and took a cautious bite. She smiled and broke eye contact, and Eliot shook his head.

"And who are you then?" Nate asked, wondering what the heck just happened between Parker and Leola.

"Leola at your service." She answered; shaking Nate's hand and turning to give everyone else a bow. Hardison and Parker laughed at Leola's bow while Eliot rolled his eyes.

Nate clapped his hands together. "Alright down to business then. What you stole from the ambassador was supposed to be for our client."

He paused to see if Leola would say anything but she just continued to look at him. Parker sank down on the couch beside Eliot and poked him once getting an irritated huff from him before turning her attention on Leola.

"Okay and your question is?" Leola asked, raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms. "You want me to hand what I got over to you."

Nate thought and nodded. It was pretty much what he was asking. "The ambassador was connected with a furnace company and billed more money for heating than what was necessary but they had no choice to but to pay since of the cold temperature. We were hired to steal his money and take his company down. Now we will have to find another way to get bac—"

"Wait why?" Leola asked confused at the last part.

"Well we were supposed to retreive the information from his laptop and hand it over to the people of the Russia and allow the public to see the scam. That way everyone would have to be refunded." Hardison explained. "But you got there first."

Leola checked to make sure they were telling the truth before she grinned. Reaching into her purse, she pulled out her phone and tossed it at Hardison.

"That's all the information on his computer. I downloaded a virus afterwards to render it unusable." She smiled, noticing Sophie still sending glares her way.

"What did you use?" Hardison asked curious.

Leola shrugged, "A phone. Just downloaded the virus on the phone and then plugged the phone into the computer."

Hardison nodded impressed, "not the best but it's simple and effective."

She smiled and turned back to Nate, walking over to the couch and sitting at the other end from Parker. She began to do her weird eyes at her again. Leola ignored it and focused her attention on Nate.

"Well the money." He spoke sheepishly.

She sighed and reached into her purse pulling the money out and handed it over. Eliot found himself feeling surprised. He never met a thief so readily to give up their prize. Apparently Nate hasn't either.

"What are you doing?" Parker asked, her eyebrows drawn together.

"Giving the money to who deserves it." she shrugged. "It was going to a friend of mine but that was why I grabbed the information as well so he will get what's coming to him anyway. You guys can have it."

Sophie couldn't hold it in any longer. She had to ask, "How did you get the ambassador to be interested in you. I did all the tricks I know and you managed to succeed."

Leola looked at Sophie a little surprised. "Perfume. If you spray it before you walk past them, it's bound to suck them in, and by that point he won't want anyone else besides you."

Sophie nodded as the thought dawned on her. "So when you and the ambassador went to the office you guys didn't..." Sophie's voice trailed off.

Leola shook her head and laughed. Holding up her ring, she flipped the ring open to reveal a small needle.

"It's a sleep concoction. That way I could steal form him in a blink of an eye and he would think we were having sex." She shrugged, "I didn't expect it to work so well but hey what do you know."

"Where did you get that concoction from anyways, I saw you use it on the guards." Eliot asked, now curious himself.

Nate focused to, trying to learn anything that would be useful from Leola.

"I made it."

"And how would you know how to make something like that?" Nate asked.

"Same way I know how to check for concussions and cracked ribs. Which reminds me, you are not allowed to do any jobs for the next three to six weeks." Pointing her finger at Eliot.

Eliot sighed nodding sarcastically mumbling something about going to get changed. She was incredibly bossy.

"Which is?" Sophie inquired.

"I'm a nurse." Leola answered thinking it should have been obvious.

"What you pulled a job as a nurse?" Nate asked and before Leola had a chance to answer, Hardison spoke up.

"No she is an actual nurse. She finished her degree about six years ago however there is no new information about employment in the last six months."

Leola glared at him. "You checked me out?"

Hardison gave a sheepish shrug. "I was curious."

Parker had been coming closer and closer until she was sitting right beside Leola. Leola looked at her and jumped before giving her a smiled, getting a small smile back from Parker.

"You saved our hitter?" Parker asked, eating a fortune cookie.

"Okay, I guess you could say that. But he saved me first so I was just paying back the favour." She explained.

"How did he save you?" Parker took out the fortune paper and took a bite out of the cookie.

"He didn't give my position away when the guards came up and surrounded him." she shrugged, "he could have used me as bait and fought his way out."

Sophie smiled, beginning to like Leola. She wasn't as bad as she had thought she was.

Eliot didn't like the fact that Leola, a girl half his size saved him. Even though she was only repaying her debt to him, he still didn't like it. And Leola was just bossy, but kind of cute in away. He needed to get out of there none the less. So while Parker and Leola discussed how much Parker loved the Tacos, Eliot slipped away to his office. Eliot shrugged to get his shirt off and checked out the bruises in the mirror. He could have gotten out of there himself but obviously with a lot more injures. He frowned, not liking the fact he liked her hazel eyes and how irritated he got when she had to have her way and she constantly flipped sides, teasing one moment, serious the next and crazy after. He just met her tonight for crying out loud. He threw on a pair of tracks and a loose fitting shirt and was relived he didn't have to wrap his own ribs. One thing he couldn't figure out was that he could take out an entire gang but he had managed to be defeated by a guy with a taser. He knew he had been distracted trying to figure out where Leola went but he thought it was under control. Taking a deep breath, shaking his head at himself, he went back out and sat on the couch.

Leola smiled at him and he gave one back as he slumped on the couch. He raised an eyebrow as Parker offered Leola a fortune cookie and Leola smiled warmly, accepting her gift. Eliot never knew her to share her fortune cookies, in fact he didn't know Parker even knew how to share and he only saw the warm part of Leola's personality in glimpses. She kept contradicting herself.

Leola stood up and walked to the kitchen to get a glass of water and Parker immediately reached down into Leola's purse and swiped her phone. Eliot smiled but didn't say anything, deciding to keep the ice on his face and besides if it kept her from poking him, he didn't mind.

"Parker, put whatever you have of mine back." Leola called out from the kitchen. Parker practically threw it back in and turned little red, eyes wide. She looked at Nate and Sophie who hid their laughs. She zeroed in on Hardison who did nothing, so occupied on his computer. He looked up to see her glaring.

"Whoa what is THAT look for?" he asked, trying to defend himself against Parker.

"She thinks you told on her." Eliot grinned; the look on Hardison's face was priceless.

"No way, uh-uh, not me I am innocent of this accusation, find somebody else to blame." His voice still could be heard as he walked into the other room.

Parker snorted and smiled innocently as Leola walked back in.

"I have eyes on the back of my head Parker." She said winking at Parker.

Parker's eyes widened as she stood up and began rooting through Leola's hair looking for eyes.

"Hello, I was speaking figuratively. It's not the first time someone has swiped something out of my purse."

Leola glanced at her watch; it was three in the morning. "Well I should get going, its morning and all."

Nate stood up and shook her hand again. "Thanks so much for understanding out situation."

Leola grinned, "Oh it's no biggie, my friend will get his money anyways so no big deal."

Turning to Eliot she put on a stern face. "Rest and I mean it."

Eliot gave a half smile, saluting her sarcastically. Then he gave her a real smile and nodded.

Leola nodded to Sophie, "remember the perfume; it's bound to work if nothing else does."

Sophie smiled and nodded back. "It was nice to meet you."

Leola headed to the door when Parker suddenly blurted, "Why did you give the money so easily. I mean its money; you know the best thing ever."

Leola turned around giving Parker another smile. "Why not? There's more where that came from and besides I still got the diamonds."

"The what?" Nate asked, standing up.

"Nothing" she smiled widely before slipping out the door without a sound.

"Did she say diamonds?" Hardison asked coming back in. "I heard diamonds, anybody hear diamonds? I know I heard diamonds."

Nate laughed, "Yeah she said diamonds but we weren't after them though."

"I like her." Parker said simply, sitting cross legged on the couch.

"Yeah she's kind of weird but alright." Eliot added, trying to remember if he said thank you. He couldn't remember. What he did know is that he wanted to see her again. He gave a small grin, knowing that he would have to thank her sometime but remembered he didn't have a phone number or address. He thought for a second before remembering Hardison.

"Hey Hardison." He called out to the table where Hardison was on his computer, sending the information about the scam the ambassador had going on.

"Yeah what's up?" Hardison replied.

"Can you get me Leola's phone number or address?" he asked, glaring at Nate and Parker's happy grin.

What was he getting himself in to, he didn't know.

**I hoped you enjoyed this! The next chapter should be up next week. :)**

**Please R&R! **


	3. Chapter 3: Hanging out

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but Leola. :)**

**Problems: Some things somehow mysteriously got cut out; but I think I managed to fix it all.**

**I hope you enjoy!**

**Chapter 3: Hanging out**

Nate got up and groaned as his splitting headache announced itself. He walked to the bathroom and took two Tylenol, closing the medicine cabinet to see his reflection in the mirror. He looked like crap. His eyes were rimmed red and his complexion was way too pale. He sighed and closed his eyes, as his son came back to mind and shook his head to put the painful past away. He headed to the kitchen and found Parker munching on some cereal.

"Uh, what are you doing at this hour?" he asked sleepily as he made himself coffee.

"It's 9:30." Parker said, watching Nate's every move. "I've been up since six."

Nate sighed, wondering how Parker did it sometimes. "Ok, well how did you get in here? I didn't unlock the door yet and I thought you lost your key."

She just pointed to the window where he saw some rope dangling and her harness thrown on the floor beside the window ledge. Nate nodded. "That figures." He muttered.

"And I do know how to pick locks thankyouverymuch." Parker sounded insulted. She made a face at him before shovelling another spoonful of cereal in her mouthful. She chewed loudly to spite Nate.

Nate just yawned and mumbled something about a shower. He was too tired to be irritated at Parker's little quirks.

He walked back to his room to grab a shower and get dressed, and Parker just shrugged, going into the meeting room, flipping the TV on.

It blared loudly, causing Parker to jump and squeal, dropping the clicker. It bounced on the table and slid across to a chair. She panicked and tried to grab the clicker but it slipped out of her hands a second time, clattering to the floor so she dashed over and pressed power. It was quiet. Her heart beating wildly, she gasped, trying to calm herself down. Giving the flat screen-TV a dirty look, she stuck out her tongue, feeling satisfied with her comeback.

She skipped out to the kitchen and bashed right into Hardison, knocking him into Eliot, who had just poured himself a nice, boiling hot cup of coffee. The coffee spilled all down the front of him.

"Dammit Hardison." Eliot yelled as the hot coffee soaked through his shirt and he lifted his shirt off his skin to keep it from burning. "Watch what you are doing!"

"Hey, that was NOT my fault. Talk to Parker." And she glared at Hardison, who replied by giving her a sweet smile before heading into the meeting room.

Eliot gave Parker a grumpy glare, his eyebrows drawn together and she gave him a sheepish smile. He fanned his shirt to cool the coffee down, his anger seeping away. He couldn't stay mad at Parker too long; nobody could.

"Sorry, the TV scared me. I was unfocused." She spoke, looking all around while scratching her head. Eliot just sighed and shook his head. Running his hand through his long brown hair, he gave her another look before heading to his office to change- Again.

After he turned around, Parker stuck her tongue out at him and stifled a giggle. Suddenly the TV blared loudly through the office again and Hardison screamed, his voice high pitched.

Sophie just walked in and stopped listening to him scream. "Who was that?" she asked Parker, who just kept laughing. Sophie listened to see if she could guess who it was.

The TV turned off. "OKAY, WHO LEFT THIS TV VOLUME ON HIGH!" Hardison yelled out of the meeting room.

Sophie laughed and nodded her head. "Yep that would have to be Hardison." she got a glass of water and looked around for Nate.

Parker snickered, giving a wide grin as Hardison walked out, slightly pale and clearing his throat.

"You could have told me." He muttered, his eyes narrowing on Parker. Parker jumped up on the counter.

"You shouldn't have sold me out to Eliot." She shot back, giving him a satisfied look before turning back to Sophie.

"Hey where is Nate?" she asked after not seeing him anywhere.

"Right here." Nate spoke as he came of out his room and joined them in the kitchen. Pouring himself another cup of coffee, he looked at parker who had an evil grin on her face. He leaned against the counter, taking a sip of his coffee enjoying the strong taste.

"Uh, what happened out here? There was lots of noises and screaming."

Sophie shook her head. "Do you really want to know?" she asked, patting him on the shoulder before walking into the meeting room.

Nate shrugged; she did have a point there and followed her.

Eliot threw his wet shirt on the floor and grabbed his last clean one that he had at the office and put it on. It was a tight fitting white t shirt. He put a hoodie on top, and put his black hat on his head. He shook his head and went back out and into the meeting room.

"Ok, what do we have today?" Nate asked, rubbing his hands together.

Hardison looked at him and scratched his head. "Uh, we have nothing just yet."

Sophie smiled excitedly. That meant she could finally do some shoe shopping. Parker gave a happy face as she thought about trying out her harness and equipment on the new building about three blocks from there.

Eliot sighed, not knowing what exactly he was going to do. He wasn't able to train just yet. His mind drifted to bars which drifted to ladies, landing on Leola. He made up his mind to see her today instead.

His mind came back to the meeting, missing out on what they were talking about.

"Alright then, have a nice day, see you guys later." Nate waved them all away.

"Alrigghhhttttt, I get to break another level on world of war craft." Hardison clapped his hands together as the others stared at him like he had four heads. He gave them a frustrated look.

"What? Parker jumps off building for fun, Eliot does training, Sophie goes shopping and I play war craft. So stop looking at me like that." He gave them his best tough look..

Eliot got up, shaking his head. "You are still a nerd." He muttered.

"Hey I heard that." Hardison rolled his eyes at him. "You don't seem to mind when you need a passport or an ID" he retorted.

Parker jumped up, waved excitedly to Nate who waved back and then skipped out of the room. She was truly happy that she would be able to scale the building sooner than planned.

Sophie laughed softly, and looked at Nate as the others walked out.

"And what are you going to do?" she asked Nate as he drank his coffee. She noticed his hair was ruffled and still damp from his shower. He wore a solid blue t-shirt with a pair of jeans, looking pretty laid back.

He shrugged. "Hang out here, relax."

She nodded, her smile softly fading as concern for Nate settled in. She was becoming increasingly worried with the fact he had started up drinking again. She bit her tongue, to keep from speaking her mind.

"You want to go out for breakfast?" she asked, hoping he would say yes.

"Uh yeah sure." Nate gave her a smile and stood up. Sophie got up as well, heading to the kitchen to pick up her purse that she left on the counter.

Nate walked out past the kitchen and glanced over at the window. The harness was gone.

"Hey Hardison, did Parker walk by you?" he asked.

Hardison looked over his shoulder, "No Eliot left before me, and Parker didn't leave yet- well, not through the door."

Nate looked back at the window and was sure she left.

Shaking his head, he said bye to Hardison, standing in the doorway. Sophie got her coat and thanked Nate as he held the door open for her. Watching after her, Nate smiled too, glad that he could have some company.

* * *

Leola sniffed her lasagne and poked a knife in it to check if it was done. Satisfied, she took it out of the oven and began to hum. She put the other lasagne in and flipped around to mix up a batch of chocolate chip cookies. There was a knock on her door and Leola frowned.

Glancing at the clock she saw it was nearing around eleven. She washed her hands, running to the door as someone knocked again. She opened the door and smiled warmly.

"Hey Fred, why don't you come in?" she opened the door wider and Fred, a man in his thirties walked in nervously wringing his hands together.

She walked to the kitchen and sliced up the lasagne. She put seven large pieces in a large container as Fred shyly walked into the kitchen. "Thanks so much Leo, I really appreciate this." He spoke, his eyes devouring the sight of the lasungna she held in her hands.

"No problem but you are kind of early." She pointed out, winking. He gave a nervous laugh.

"Couldn't help meself. I can smell the food cooking outside."

She laughed and handed him the container of lausunga. His dirty hands took hold of the container tightly and he kept thanking her, his brown eyes full of appreciation.

Fred was a man living homeless on the street outside of her apartment and she felt incredibly bad as she knew he could smell the food cooking. So every week, she cooked him up something that would keep for a few days and he would let her know if anybody suspicious looking came sniffing around her apartment. It was a good deal.

"You can let yourself out Hun." She said, turning around to put some cookie dough in the pan. "Make sure you close the door this time!" she added, listening for the door to close. It never did.

She shook her head, and decided not to bother closing it and turned her music up; temperature by Sean Paul came on. It wouldn't hurt to wait a few minutes before going to shut it.

Eliot checked the address one more time before making up his mind and got out of his car. He began muttering greetings underneath his breath but they all seemed so fake or cheap. He walked u p the stairs and smelled the aroma of cookies. Raising an eyebrow as he neared a door that was open and music played loudly.

He eyed the apartment number and rolled his eyes. Of course, it was Leola's. He went to knocked but felt like a fool. How the heck would she hear his knock over that racket?

Walking in cautiously, he looked around, taking in the surroundings. The left, there was a hallway and he guessed her room and the bathroom was that way. He stepped into the living room where a black leather couch lined the wall, a TV on the opposite side on a brown tv stand with surround sound speakers and a small dinner table in the corner. Books littered the place; on the book shelves, on the floor, and there even was a pile on top of the TV. He looked around once again but there was one last place to look and that was where the source of the loud music was coming from. He walked stealthy on the hard wooden floors to the kitchen to smile at the scene in front of him.

She was belly dancing to the music while washing the dishes and putting them away. She danced over to the oven, opening it, wincing as she got a rush of hot air in her face and took out the pan of cookies. Kicking the oven closed, she set them down beside the second lasagne, reaching for the metal spatula, still dancing to the music. He stood there and crossed his arms, smiling, waiting for her to notice him.

She turned around with the spatula and finally saw him. She screeched and her instinct took over. She threw the spatula at him.

His eyes widened in shock, seeing a spatula fly towards him and he barely ducked it in time. He got into a defensive stance, not expecting that type of reaction. She covered her mouth instantly and mouthed sorry.

She went over and shut off the music. She whipped around.

"What the hell do you think you are doing, sneaking up on me like that!" her eyes flashing. He made a mental note not to do THAT again.

"The door was open and your music was on so loud that even if I knocked, you wouldn't be able to even hear It." he answered back surprised, still reeling from the spatula which he eyed with suspiciously before flickering his gaze on her.

She was furious, standing there in her pink polka dotted pyjamas bottoms and a tank top sporting snoopy. He smirked; she looked comical. It was hard to be wary of her in that outfit.

"It's not funny." She gave him a dirty look, growling, "Next time I'm gonna throw a hot cookie. Not just hot, but oven hot, so hot it would burn." She turned around pointing a cookie at him. She took a big bite and spat it out, fanning her tongue. "Okay that was stupid, hot hot hot." She ran to the sink and drank big mouthfuls of cold water to wash away the burning sensation in her mouth.

Eliot couldn't help but laugh and he leaned against the doorway, arms crossed with an amused smile on his face. "Well this wasn't exactly how I pictured you saying good morning." He teased.

Her cheeks burned and she knew she had made a fool out of herself. Turning around, wiping the water from her mouth, she gave a sarcastic nod. "What's up?"

He laughed, picking up the spatula, pain flickering on his face for second as his ribs twanged. Handing over the spatula, she looked at him with concern.

"What?" he asked, a dubious look overcoming his face.

She grinned. "Never you mind." She turned around and flipped the cookies off the pan and onto a plate, setting the plate on the table. "sit." She ordered, taking two plates and forks over and then retrieving the first pan of lausna.

Eliot obeyed; the food looked too good to pass up and it was almost lunch time anyways. "Want some tea after?" she asked, putting the kettle for herself.

"Yeah sure." He answered.

She walked over and sat down, cutting two pieces of lasagne, and put them on the plates. She flipped the knife and twisted it, setting it down beside her with ease. Eliot didn't miss that. He took a first bite and savoured it. "Mmm that's really good. What do you put in this?" he asked, before shovelling in another mouthful.

She suddenly gave him an evil grin. Leaning in she whispered, "You wouldn't believe how cat add flavour."

He spat his food out, giving her a furious look. She burst out laughing but apparently, he didn't find it too funny.

"You know Parker does that to me all the time. It's not cool, that's food we are talking about." Still giving her another glare.

Between her laughs, she managed to finally speak, "its just beef and it's the spices that add the flavour."

Glaring at her, he took a cautious bite, watching Leola's expression, making her laugh even harder. Holding a hand to her side to ease the stitches, she managed to calm herself down.

"I can't believe you actually thought it was true." She said, chuckling, taking a bite as well.

"Well I know not to believe you anymore now don't I" he retorted. "That aside, what is in this and do not say dog or parrot or something bizarre." She laughed again, unable to control it. Eliot just growled and took another bite..

"Cayenne pepper, black pepper, garlic splash- a spicy sauce, and italiano." She said smiling.

Eliot nodded. "It's amazing."

"Well, I'm glad you like it."

They ate the rest in comfortable silence and then she got up to make tea. "Oh did you close the door on your way in?" she asked, taking two cups out of the cupboard. She set them down beside the kettle on the counter.

Eliot nodded, "didn't think you wanted it open. Why was it open anyway?'

"Oh that was Fred. He has something against closing doors. He tried telling me once about each time he closes a door, he hears the alarm go off." She shrugged. "I don't know but maybe he was a security guard at one point in his life."

Eliot didn't answer, thinking about this Fred guy who was here before him. Was he her boyfriend? Did he stay the night? The questions swirled in his mind and Leola laughed, seeing his expression.

"Fred is the homeless guy outside eating lasagne. He gets food from me every week."

Eliot couldn't help but feel relieved.

Pouring the tea, she spoke again. "So what exactly is it your team does?"

"We are thieves but we run cons on the corrupted people."

"Oh so like Robin Hood." She stated. Eliot nodded, giving her a smile he was famous for.

She smiled and nodded, passing his cup to him, sitting down on the chair, one leg up and the other hanging down.

"What did Parker call you..." she trailed off, snapping her fingers trying to figure out what Parker called him when she first met them.. Her face lit up, "oh yeah a hitter?"

Eliot tensed up slightly as he nodded. "Yeah you could say that. I'm the muscle of the group." Woman had a tendency not to like what he did.

"So basically you beat up people?" she asked and Eliot nodded. "Like a mercenary?"

"Well the technical name is retrieval specialist." He said, drinking his tea, keeping a close eye on her reactions.

"hmm." She sipped her tea.

"You don't fit the normal description of a hitter or muscle or whatever you wanna call It." she said, her head cocked to one side.

"Oh yeah? And why is that?" he asked half sarcastic and half curious.

She shrugged. "Well number one, you are way in control of yourself, and number two, you are too emotional."

His eyes grew wide. "Me? Emotional? I'm not emotional" he argued.

"Yes you are, you are particular grumpy, which is feelings by the way." she put her hand up, snapping her fingers at him to stay quiet as he tried to speak. Giving an irritated huff, he gave up and stopped. "See? Like that. You get irritated but you smile and have fun.. And I saw the way you looked at your teammates."

She spoke seriously. "Very protective like." She nodded slowly as if thinking that over. "You are like...a bear." Eliot just stared at her as she compared him to an animal. "You protect the younger or weaker ones."

He nearly choked on his tea. Was she calling him a mother bear? "Are you saying I am the mother of the cubs?" he asked, his voice a couple decibels higher.

"Well no, well yeah, well no you are the father; ooh I'm getting this all wrong." She frowned, trying to think. "You're just protective. Let's put it like that. You care about the others." She gulped some tea, trying to stop herself from digging a deeper hole.

"Yeah ok, still don't see how I am the mother." He grumbled.

"Oh get over it I said I was wrong. OH like you could have used me as bait but you didn't so you have a conscience. You care about others."

Eliot gulped his tea as her words hit close to home, bringing up memories he wanted forgotten. "Okay" he quickly agreed, so he could change the subject. His blue eyes locked with hers and she ate a cookie, studying him.

Without breaking eye contact, she picked up a cookie and smiled. "Want to try one?"

He looked into her eyes smiling and nodded, taking it from her.

His fingers brushed hers and her stomach suddenly began doing back flips. "Oh snicker doodle." She mumbled, trying to force the weird feeling down.

"What?" Eliot wasn't sure what he just heard.

"Nothing just said snicker doodle." She replied, taking a deep breath, the feeling finally going away.

"What's a snicker doodle?" he asked trying to picture what it would look like.

"It's a cookie Eliot." She explained, looking at him like he was crazy for not knowing or something.

He scoffed, "and how was I supposed to know?"

"I just told you Hun."

Eliot sighed, and drank what was left o his tea. It was no use to argue.

She finished hers and stood up, stretching. "Alrighty." She walked over, washing the dishing and Eliot stood up as well and went to dry them. She scrubbed the dishes from the lunch they just had and handed them to Eliot who then dried them and put them away where she told him to. He stood beside her and his arm brushed hers as he leaned over to put away a cup. She felt butterflies in her stomach again. She shook her head and bushed the feeling back again.

He dried a frying pan that had a humongous dent on the side, folding the side of the pan inwards. He gave her a weird look and pointed to the pan. "Uh what happened here?"

"Oh I hit a guy with it a couple years ago."

Eliot definilty decided she wasn't one to mess with. "And why would you do that?"

She gave him a look. "Hello, he broke into my apartment, with a gun and I was cooking bacon." She shrugged a shoulder. "So after he shot up my oven, I beat him up with my frying pan."

"Uh huh." Eliot looked at the frying pan one last time before shaking his head and putting it in the cupboard. "Yeah I suppose nobody would want to sneak up on you. You have a tendency to throw whatever is in your hand and hit people with hot frying pans."

She laughed. "Well they should know not to come in without letting me know and definitnly shouldn't do that when I'm hungry." She teased, drying her hands.

Eliot gave her a smile, his blue eyes twinkling and Leola felt her stomach do flip-flops again. What is with that? She wondered.

She frowned. How did he know where she lived? And what was he doing here anyways?

"Um Eliot? I don't mean to sound rude, but how did you find out where I lived?"

Eliot looked at her and his lips twitched. "Hardison is a hacker. He can find out anything"

"Ah I see. Well I don't mean to be rude again, but why did you come here?" she asked, looking at him with her hazel-green eyes.

He locked eyes with her and felt himself begin to panic. "Uh just to say thanks." He mumbled and she gave him a sweet smile. "I didn't remeber saying thanks and besides, I wanted to see you again."

She blushed, as she looked into his blue eyes and sighed dreamily, inwardly as his lips formed a smile. He brushed a strand of hair out of her face and his smile got bigger. He rubbed his thumb over her cheek and she had to remember to inhale. Dang he was cute.

Shaking her head out of a fantasy, she began pushing him towards the door.

"wellnoproblemgladtoseeyouand Ineedtoshowerandgetdressedand youhavetostartgoingandthisway youcanseemeagain. bye!"

she pushed all the words together and then pushed him out the door and slammed it closed. She leaned against the door, exhaling sharphly, trying to brush away the weird feeling which had multiplied. Shaking her head hard, she headed for the shower.

Shocked, he scratched his head and grinned. It was a good start. He walked down the stairs before realizing he left his jacket. Walking back up, he scolded himself and walked back down but then walked back up. He stopped and nodded to himself. No, he would leave it there; that way he could come back.

Smiling again, he exhaled and walked out of the building.

* * *

Parker went back to Nate's leverage apartment and grabbed a drink of water. It had been fun, jumping off the new building. She nearly got caught but she was gone before they had even bother to check if someone broke in. she closed her eyes smiling, recalling the feeling of jumping off into the air, adrenaline pumping. Her hair would rush backwards as the wind would whip it back, as her speed picked up. Looking out the window, she suddenly came up with an idea. Grabbing her harness, zip line and rope, she headed up to the roof of Nate's 12 storey building.

After fixing up what she had planned, she walked over to Hardison's apartment and picked the lock. She slipped in, stepping quietly into the computer room where Hardison had a whole other thing going on. Her eyes grew wide as she spied three large computer screens, surround sound and a bunch of wires running here and there.

"Oh yeah!" hardison whooped. "Take that ha-ha! oh watch out, ah I see you, where are you hiding-hey come here, COME HERE-OH GOTCHA! WHOOO!" he pumped fisted at the air. "Thank you, thank you." He gave imaginary bows to the computer.

Parker scrunched up her face at him. And they thought she was weird. She put her face right beside his. "Hey Hardison."

"WHOA!" Hardison jumped out of the chair and slammed his back against the wall holding his chest. "STOP DOING THAT! If you keep it up, I'm not gonna grow old and have children."

Parker grinned. "You should pay more attention instead of bowing to your computer." And she looked at the screens. "And everyone thinks I'm weird."

Hardison huffed. "What would you like Parker?" He asked in a fake pleasant tone.

"I would like Leola's address." She looked around to make sure no one was listening. Hardison looked around too, wondering what she was looking for. She leaned in and Hardison came closer. "I have a surprise for her." she whispered.

Hardison nodded sarcasterically, cringing as he thought of Parker's surprises. They were always a shocker. He walked over to his other desk in the corner of the room and scribbled something down.

"Here." He handed a piece of paper he scribbled on and she grinned. "You coming back to Nate are around three? I think Eliot is cooking."

"Oh yeah I will be there." Hardison said absent mindely as he focused on his game. Parker yelled out bye before slipping out to head over to Leola's.

Parker walked up the stairs to Leola's apartment and knocked on the apartment door.

Leola frowned, drying her hair and walked to the door and opened it to see Parker standing there excitedly.

"Oh hey Parker." Leola smiled greeting her, throwing the wet towel behind her on the floor.

"Come, I have something to show you." Parker could barely stay still.

"Oh ok um let me grab my shoes." Thankful she had gotten dressed already, she threw her curly hair into a ponytail and grabbed her purse heading out the door. Parker grabbed her hand, surprising herself and practically dragged Leola down the stairs and Leola jumped a few to keep up with her. Man she was fast.

"Uh parker, Hun you need to slow down." She said, straining to keep up with her. Parker just nodded and took off for the sidewalk.

Leola frowned. "Parker where are you taking me?"

"Oh back to Nate's." She answered smiling excidelty.

"Ok let's take my car."

Parker agreed and climbed into the passenger seat. "Go fast though; I want to show you what I want to show you now." She said, her eyes glowing.

Leola grinned. "That won't be a problem." Shifting into gear, she peeled out onto the road casuing some cars to squeal as they tried to avoid hitting her.

She expertly drove around them and tore through the streets and getting to Nate's in record time. She braked, and parked and Parker laughed.

"Well Eliot was right. You are a crazy driver." She leaned in. "I think that awesome."

Leola laughed but Parker already went around Leola's side and pulled her out of the car. "Oh Parker slow down jeez."

Parker ran to the elevator and stepped in.

"Come on, come on." Parker insisted as she held the elevator. Leola ran in, wondering where Parker was taking her. Parker pressed up and could barely contain her excitement and Leola began to find it contagious.

Parker took some gear out of her bag; that Leola didn't even notice Parker carrying and put it on herself. She pulled another harness out and held it out for Leola.

Leola eyed the gear and looked at Parker. Parker laughed and helped her put it on; expertly checking to make sure it was on properly.

"Can you tell me what we are doing?" Leola asked smiling at the excited Parker. Parker shook her head no.

Leaning in, she whispered, "It's a surprise."

Leola's grin fell slightly, as she REALLY didn't do well with surprises.

"Um didn't we go past Nate's floor?" she asked, watching the floor numbers go higher and higher.

"Oh we are heading there later."

The elevator doors open and Parker grabbed her arm and yanked her out, running to the door marked exit. She picked the lock and grinned at Leola who began to be cautious. She had no idea what Parker had planned.

Parker ran out onto the roof, over close to the edge of the building as Leola came out of the building. Frowning, she walked over to Parker who just finished putting her zip line one herself. She grabbed Leola and began to put her zip line on with expert fingers and Leola finally looked at her equipment and felt her stomach drop. It suddenly dawned on her what Parker had in mind. But she hated heights.

"Um Parker ha." She started, nervous. "Hey Parker." Trying to get her attention, Parker grinned and turned serious as she saw Leola's white face.

"You ok? You look like icing." She asked, causing Leola to give a nervous giggle.

"Uh yeah well no, um see the thing is Parker, is that I hate heights. Not good with them at all, I don't even like it up here." Giving a shaky breath as she looked out and saw the cars below. "Yep I don't like it. So yeah." She shrugged nodding her head.

Parker looked at her seriously, nodding her head too. "This will help." Parker paused and Leola hesitated, turning Parker's words over in her mind.

Parker grinned, "SURPRISE!" And pushed Leola off the building.

"PAAAARRRRRRKKKKEEEERRRRR!" she screamed as she fell off and into the air.

**Ok, I lied, I posted sooner than I said I would...Hope you dont mind ;).**

**Please Let me know how you like it so far and if the characters sound like...well their characters lol. **

**Please R&R!**


	4. Chapter 4: Parker's surprise

** I had sort of writer's block on this chapter for some reason. I'm sooo thankful my best friend lalabada123 (she's an author on here too) helped me through it. she spent two to three hours talking to me, encouraging me to continue to write this chapter when I wanted to quit. I'm glad she has ALOT of patience. :)**

**So this chapter is dedicated to her and Thanks so much for your help! **

**Enjoy reading this chapter and Dont forget to review! ;)**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but Leola. :)**

**Chapter 3: Hanging out**

"Um Parker ha." She started, nervous. "Hey Parker." Trying to get her attention, Parker grinned and turned serious as she saw Leola's white face.

"You ok? You look like icing." She asked, causing Leola to give a nervous giggle.

"Uh yeah well no, um see the thing is Parker, is that I hate heights. Not good with them at all, I don't even like it up here." Giving a shaky breath as she looked out and saw the cars below. "Yep I don't like it. So yeah." She shrugged nodding her head.

Parker looked at her seriously, nodding her head too. "This will help." Parker paused and Leola hesitated, turning Parker's words over in her mind.

Parker grinned, "SURPRISE!" And pushed Leola off the building.

"PAAAARRRRRRKKKKEEEERRRRR!" she screamed as she fell off and into the air.

**Chapter 4: Parker's surprise**

Hardison opened the door. Walking in, he glanced around and hollered out.

"In here." Eliot answered and Hardison walked to the kitchen to find Eliot chopping away at vegetables; a stir-fry sizzling on the stove.

"What's up?" Hardison nodded to Eliot and Eliot greeted him.

He sat down on the couch and flicked the TV on. It was a couple of minutes, besides the chopping of the vegetables and the noise coming from the TV. Hardison sat up, not moving. Eliot looked at him, wondering what he was doing.

"Do you hear that?" Hardison asked.

Eliot listened but all he could hear was the TV. Hardison flicked it off. "Listen listen." Eliot stopped what he was doing and strained his hearing. He could hear it now.

"Hear that?"

Eliot nodded.

Muffled screaming could be heard. "It sounds like it's...above...or outside."

Eliot walked closer to the windows. Suddenly the screaming got louder and they looked out to see Leola screaming her head off as she dropped right pass the window.

Looking down watching her, Hardison laughed.

"What was that about?" Eliot asked, as Parker flew by too.

"Parker's surprise."

Eliot cringed mentally at the thought of Parker's surprises. He was lucky he didn't have any come to him, yet.

"Not the first time Parker did that." Hardison shuddered as well, recalling the time when Parker threw him off a building as well.

"Makes sense" Hardison thought aloud. "Her surprises are always end with a screamer." Hardison smirked, flipping the TV on as Leola's screaming quieted with distances.

"We are gonna need popcorn. Can you throw a bag in the microwave?" he asked looking at Eliot expectantly.

Eliot glared at him. "Get it yourself. I'm cooking."

Hardison grumbled but quickly got up and did it himself as Eliot gave him another threatening glare.

* * *

Leola screamed again, her voice like a bullhorn. She could hear Parker laughing faintly over the roar of the wind. She flailed her arms to try to do what? She didn't know.

Her hair whipped back from her face, she could clearly see the cars got bigger and bigger.

"Parker! I'm going to kill you if I live!" she screeched as the pavement came closer and closer. She gave another shrill scream and covered her face. She did not want to see the pavement. Suddenly she stopped.

Trembling, she peeked though her fingers to see the city upside down. Looking down, she saw she was only five feet off the ground. She thrashed trying to get down and ended hitting a guy in the back and smacking a woman across the face.

"Oh sorry, sorry, don't mind me." She apologized breathlessly as they cursed at her.

She hung there, defeated. She saw Nate and Sophie walk up, their arms linked. "Oh hey Nate." She spoke causally. "How's it going Sophie?"

Sophie moved her arm smoothly from Nate's, turning her head sideways. "Leola?"

"Fancy meeting you here." Leola smiled, playing her upside down-ness as if it was a normal thing, thinking her smile must looked like she was grimacing since was upside down. Man she couldn't wait to get her hands on Parker.

"Uh what are you up to?" Nate asked, eyeing the rope.

"Oh you know. Just hanging around." There was a pause. "Parker had a surprise for me."

"Ah that makes sense." Sophie laughed as Parker propelled down and expertly unclipped herself.

"Hello Parker." Leola glared at her. "Mind letting me down?"

"Oh sure no problem." She unclipped her and Leola crashed on the ground and didn't move.

She exhaled shakily relieved to be touching the ground underneath. Her heart still pumped wildly and the shock still coursing through her body.

"Uh you ok?" Parker asked, coming closer. "You still look like icing. Did you like your surprise?" She asked more excited.

Leola groaned and became very irritable. "Parker, you have three seconds before I get up and give YOU a surprise."

Parker hesitated.

"One."

Parker looked at Sophie and Nate. "I think she means it Parker." Sophie tried to keep her laughs to herself.

"Two."

"Oh boy." Parker ran inside the building up to Nate's apartment.

"THREE! I'm gonna get you!" she screamed jumping up and running in swiftly after her.

"Come on, we don't want to miss this." Nate put a hand on Sophie's back and guided her in.

Running up the stairs, she saw Parker four floors ahead of her.

"I thought you liked your surprise!" she yelled down, running across the hallway to Nate's.

Leola caught up with her, as she opened the door and ran in. Leola ran into the door and propelled it open, eyes flickering everywhere for Parker.

"Liked it? I was screaming in terror, not enjoyment." Her voice had gone up a few decibels.

Eliot stopped chopping the vegetables when Parker ran in. "Quick, I think she wants to kill me."

Hardison laughed. "That's what you get when you decide to throw people off buildings for fun."

Eliot just stood there, a grin on his face.

"Oh you are no help whatsoever." She grumbled and took to running around the couch when Leola ran in.

"It was your surprise! I thought you would have liked it." She was having a hard time not laughing at Leola's wild expression.

"I said I was not good with heights! Not that I was good with them!"

She ran around the couch after Parker and then jumped over it, nearly clipping Hardison in the process.

"Eliot! Step in anytime!" Parker squealed, running into the meeting room.

'HEY! Not in there! Don't touch anything!" Hardison yelled out. There was thumping noises as chairs got knocked over.

"Don't touch the computer screen!" he screeched and ran in the room. A split second later, he came running back out, Parker hot on his heels.

"Move!" she yelled, pushing Hardison out of the way.

"Not cool man, not cool." He shook his head as Leola ran past him.

Sophie and Nate walked in and surveyed the scene in front of them. Nate laughed and jumped out of the way when Parker ran into the kitchen.

Eliot decided that was enough. He set the knife down and wrapped his arm around Leola's waist as she rushed past him. Lifting her off her feet, he turned around and set her down, still holding her.

"Eliot just what do you think you're doing?" her voice was smooth after she realized what just happened.

"Well, I'm cooking and you're gonna get hurt or, uh get someone hurt. Besides running around won't help solve your problems."

She scowled making everyone laugh.

Parker walked hesitantly towards her but stopped. "I thought you liked your surprise." She spoke in a tiny voice that reminded Leola of a child.

Leola huffed. "Ok. Maybe somewhere deep down and I mean DEEP, I felt some weird form of exhilaration."

Parker broke out into a big smile.

"However," she put her hand up. "Please don't be throwing me off building anytime soon." She added.

"Sounds good." Parker made a face. "But didn't it help your fear?"

She sighed. Leola tried to reason with herself to stay calm. "Well, when I say I don't like heights, it doesn't mean throwing me off the building will be the right treatment." She said sternly looking at Parker.

Parker nodded. "So I don't get your surprise?" she sounded hopeful.

"Nope not this time" Leola replied and Parker smiled relieved as Hardison laughed.

Leola went to move but she found Eliot's arm still around her waist. She was suddenly aware of her back against his chest and she could feel him chuckle.

"You can let go anytime soon." She spoke trying to move again. His arm tightened but loosened so fast, Leola though maybe she imagined it.

Eliot went back to the kitchen to finish up his stir-fry. Adding the pieces of chicken, he checked the rice and sauce. Everything was in order. But He couldn't stop thinking about her.

"Alright then, if everything is now resolved," looking at Leola and Parker who merely smiled sweetly at him, "I got us a case."

"I'm listening." Hardison plopped his butt down on the stool beside Parker. Leola began to feel out of place. She stepped back, just enough to feel like she wasn't intruding.

"She will be here in a few minutes."

The all sat down to eat and Leola stole glances from Eliot who just smiled back at her. She felt out of place. She couldn't figure out if she should stay or leave. Before she managed to figure out the answer, the woman was there.

"Hello, I'm Nate." He shook the woman's hand. She had long brown hair and it was pulled back into a braid.

Leola couldn't help but notice her eyes. They were deep brown but they were full of desperation. She hated that seeing that look on people's faces. It meant they had nowhere else to turn.

"I am Dohna Gephel." She greeted everyone else and they all sat down.

"How can we help you Dohna?" Sophie asked, her voice warm but professional.

"I don't know what you can do but I've tried everything. The lawyers and my family still cannot get it back."

Sophie nodded.

"So what happened?" Nate asked, sitting back in the chair.

Dohna took a deep breath before beginning her story.

"My family has a heirloom that has been in my family for many generations, and um, well the museum heard of it when we walked past their exhibit and mentioned that we had a Tibetan box used for sacred keeping. They asked my father if he would loan it to them for the exhibit." She cleared her throat, a little upset.

"My father agreed after I managed to check it all out and it had been accepted by the curator, the unit director and manager of collections. I should have gone with him but I had my family to care for. My children were sick with the flu. He told me he could do it."

She gave a small laugh and Sophie encouraged her to continue.

"I should have gone; he still didn't understand too much English. He went to sign the loan transaction but an error occurred and what he signed was to donate the heirloom to the museum. After I figured out what happened, I asked for it back but there is a policy about returns, that even with a tax receipt, because they have full ownership of the heirloom, they cannot return it to us. So I tried to deaccesion the heirloom, meaning remove but they don't need to remove it at the request of the donor."

She looked around desperately at the team and Leola couldn't help but feel angry.

Dohna continued, "So I tried the repatriation where it needs to be returned to rightful country of origin, but since it's a private heirloom and we are in United States, it fell through..." she trailed off. "Um I heard about you guys, but I don't know what you can do that I haven't already done." She spoke slowly, a glimmer of hope in her eyes.

Parker gave a grin and the team smiled. "We will get it back for you." Nate replied, smiling himself.

"ohh thank you! That would mean so much to me." She smiled, her eyes full of hope now

"Do you have any pictures on what the heirloom looks like and what museum is it at?" Nate asked.

She took a folder out of her purse. "It's all in there." She thanked everyone repeatedly and then finally left. Leola felt left out but since she was curious, she decided to stay and listen.

"Ok, so that the job. The museum is the County Museum of Art and this is the heirloom." Nate passed around the pictures and Hardison immediately went looking up the museum on the computer.

"Ok, the County Museum of Art. It's showing the Tibetan exhibit featuring furniture from the 1800's and it looks like that heirloom is one of the main attractions." Hardison spoke, putting the picture up on the big screen for everyone to see.

"And this is the Curator." He pressed the clicker and a picture of a man came up. Leola did a double take at the picture and quietly began to fume.

"This is-"

"That's Joseph Macarmond." Leola interrupted, her eyes flickering on the picture. Nate turned around and looked at her. He had forgotten about her being there.

"You know him?"

She laughed. "Know him? Yeah you could say that." She said dryly, not giving any more information.

Eliot gave her a thoughtful look. She didn't seem to like this guy very much.

"Okay then, well this where it's being held," Hardison put the picture of the safe up. "It has motion sensors and the works but it has a password safety and a mobile barcode needed in order to open it. The mobile barcode would be on a phone or something. That would most likely be in the curator's office." He explained after seeing some frowns.

"So when would be the best time to hit the museum?" Parker asked.

Leola spoke up, "if I'm correct, it would have to be early morning. If he's the same person I knew, he would have security on less in the morning and then more in the afternoon because the exhibit wouldn't open until noon." She said, pointing up to the screen where the time of the exhibit was being held.

Nate looked at her for a moment before nodding his head slowly. "Ok that would work. So we hit it in two days."

Everyone got up to go when Leola spoke. "Can I help?" she blushed when everyone's eyes looked to her.

"Why do you want to help with this case?" Nate asked, crossing his arms.

She shrugged, "Number one I am bored and wouldn't mind having something to do and Number two," she pointed to the picture of Joseph.

"That new curator of theirs? He's well; you could say an old flame of mine I've wanted to get back at."

She gave them an evil grin and Parker smiled. She looked at Nate hopefully and he looked to Sophie as Eliot and Hardison nodded to each other.

"Let's see what you got."

**I hope you enjoyed this! Please please please let me know what you think! **

**the next chapter will be up soon. :)**


	5. Chapter 5: The deaccession of Joseph

**Hello! Here is another chapter so enjoy! :)**

**Author note: Not complaining or anything but...pleaase review. I have no way of knowing if this is any good or not and whether it is realistic/relatable to Leverage.**

**So pleaase review and let me know what you think! I would love to hear from you guys. :)**

**Chapter 5: The Deaccession Of Joseph**

"Okay let's do this as rehearsed. Talking to you Leola." Nate's voice floated over the com.

"I know, I know." she grumbled as she walked up to the doors of the museum. "I'm the seller and ex-girlfriend. You know, I shed no tears for that piece of fudgy crap."

Hardison looked at Nate strangely, wonder what the heck fudgy crap was.

"Is it just me or does she usually use food or other terms in place of swearing." Parker commented.

"Hey! I can hear you." She whispered into the com. "Wow, these are really good ear piecey thingies Hardison."

Hardison broke out into a big smile. "Thank you very much. Make them myself."

"Ah no wonder they are so good." Leola looked around the main floor. "Okay, I'm in place."

"Alright, you know what to do" Nate reassured.

Leola took a deep breath and went to the security center. "Hi, I'm here to speak to Joseph Macarmond about a sale of an artefact."

"Alright, if you take the elevator up to the fourth floor and turn to your right, there is a door on the left." He gave her a smile and she nodded and headed into the elevator.

"Alright I'm heading up. Sophie you here yet?" she fingered the box she held in her hands nervously.

"I am on my way." Sophie looked at Hardison. "You have my ID?"

Hardison nodded. "Yep, you are now Andrea Grey, the manager of collections on her way to review the exhibit showing tomorrow."

Sophie smiled, smoothing down her business outfit. "There we go." She spoke, in her British accent.

"Okay, Sophie is now on her way. Eliot what about you?" Nate asked using the comms.

Eliot went behind the museum building where there was a loading dock. He walked in, careful not to address anyone and spied a changing room. Looking around to see if it was open, he snuck inside. Coming out, he was a loader's uniform. "I'm in." and he headed to the loading dock.

"Alrighty then. Now Leola, remember that you are the ex girlfriend selling an artefact you had gotten from a private individual, try to be civil to him though."

Leola scowled. "I know. But I better be able to punch him after we're through."

Eliot chuckled and Nate frowned. "Is this going to be a problem Leola? What exactly is the history between you two?"

"Oh you know the history. It's the same old story that creeps normally have." The elevator dinged. "I got it under control, don't worry." She stepped out, her heels clacking on the hard floor and turned right. Choosing a door on her left, she knocked and walked in.

"Hello, my name is Joseph Macarmond, the security desk let me know you were heading up here and it's nice to mee—" she turned around.

"Leola? Leola Givens?"

She looked into her eyes and forced the bile in her throat down. She smiled at him, hoping it looked real. "Hey. Wow long time Joseph." She spoke sweetly, walking towards him. "You got your dream job that is just so awesome."

He laughed and she took a moment to look at him. He was the same old handsome man. His brown hair was brushed back and his brown eyes giving off a sense of trust while his smile still managed to charm her.

"Yeah you like it? I got it about three months ago."

She nodded and smiled at him and took a deep breath in. "well I'm the client that wants to sell you something." She gave a little laugh and held up her box.

"Ah, right down to business; the same Leola as always, you haven't changed bit my dear." She gave a real smile this time.

She heard Sophie laugh. "Were you a thief back then?"

Leola cleared her throat and said no.

"Sorry?" Joseph asked confused.

"Oh nothing, it was nice to see you again. You haven't changed much either." She spoke smooth and clear.

He smiled seriously. "Yes I have. I'm better now."

There was a moment of pause and Nate wondered if things were still going as planned. Just as he was about to ask when Leola spoke.

"Well I have something to sell. I think it would be in your best interest to buy it." she opened the box and showed him the statue.

Joseph's eyes widened in shock. "The Gautama Buddha, the bodhisavatta with his legs crossed in the lotus position." He came closer.

"Yes, seated in mediation and crafted in the 12th century, made from bronze." She completed for him, walking to the window. She unlocked the window slyly and walked back to the box.

Joseph came closer hesitating. "Why do you want to sell this?"

"I have no use for it. I bought it from an anonymous seller, so it's either this museum or buyer who has his eye on it." She looked at him closely.

He took a step back, rubbing his chin. "Okay, I will see and I will need to see if it's authentic however. How about today? If you came come back sometime in the next hour, she should be here."

Leola smiled; He was hooked. "Sounds good to me."

"Okay, ask him to walk you down; we still need the mobile barcode of his in the office. Parker you ready?" Nate asked.

Parker grinned, checking her zip line. "Ready" she got into position, waiting for the signal.

Leola stood up and shook Joseph's hand, squeezing it slightly. "It was nice to see you again." She gave him a smile and he smiled back. "Can you walk me down?"

"Oh sure, definitely." He motioned for her to walk around and he looked at her and shook his head.

"He's out" Leola muttered.

"Alright parker, go."

Parker ran off the building, closing her eyes, embracing the fall. She slowed down until she was right at Joseph's office window. Checking it, she opened the window and slipped inside. "Aright I'm in."

"Okay, check the desk drawer. It should be there. I'm hacking his computer for the password." Said Hardison.

Parker picked the lock but found nothing. She relayed that information to the team.

"Um check the lock box behind the chair, its brown." Leola whispered as Joseph pressed the elevator button.

Looking around, Parker saw a lockbox under some books on the bookshelf. "Got it." she said grabbing the phone, turning it on. "It's got some weird barcode thingy."

Nate began to wonder how she knew the museum so well.

"That's the one, good work. And I got the password, woo-who I'm good." Parker laughed at Hardison and clipped herself back on her zip line, closing the window. Looking around the empty room, she whispered, "I was never here." With that she zipped back to the roof.

Sophie walked up to the museum doors. Walking in, she flashed her ID at the security, giving them a 'don't mess with me' look. They just stood up and nodded and she went on her way.

"Okay, I'm heading the file room." She said over the comm.

"Good okay. The file should be under the name of Gephel."

Sophie went in the file room, looking for anybody who looked at her suspiciously. She looked through the files under the transactions. She found it. "Okay, I got it and I also got an empty loan transaction bill too." She frowned looking at the two papers. That's funny." She muttered to herself.

"What's funny?" Nate asked.

"These two appears, well they are identical in the format and everything." She looked at the printout of the papers.

"They are made under the name of Joseph Macarmond. He must be showing them the loan transaction one first and switching it with a donor bill afterwards." Sophie checked the others and in each file under Joseph's name, there had been a complaint or file asking to deaccesion the artefacts.

"Damn. With Dohna's father barely speaking English; it would be easy to fool him." Hardison said glancing at Nate who nodded.

"He's not the only one who got fooled, Nate." Sophie said, checking the others.

"Okay, we are going to take him down. Sophie, come back out of the building, tell the security people that you will be back and you will need to talk to Joseph Macarmond."

"Sounds good." She closed the drawers and slipped the papers into her purse. Walking out, she did as Nate asked and headed to the van.

Walking Leola to the door, Joseph put his hand gently on Leola's arm. She tensed up immediately and tried to correct herself but it was too late.

Joseph frowned. "You still mad at me Leola? It was a long time ago."

She gave a small laugh and forced herself to smile. "Not long enough." She patted him on the arm and turned to walk out. He grabbed her wrist gently and pulled her close and whispered.

"You caused the problem. You did that, not me."

She looked at him directly in the eye. "And I solved it didn't I?" she laughed. "I will see you in a about a half an hour."

He laughed too. "Ok, bye."

She turned around and lost her smile, a scowl in place. Walking over to Hardison's van, she hopped in and did a double take. Parker, Sophie, Hardison, Nate AND Eliot were in there. It was pretty crowded.

"What's going on?" she asked, trying to keep her voice cool.

"Well we have a change of events." Nate began to speak. "Dohna's father is not the only one who filed a complaint about the donor mistake. And it's all under Joseph's name." Hardison gave her the two papers to compare.

"They are identical. He's been running a scam." Sophie spoke, watching Leola's reaction.

Leola just grinned. "Goodie. We can take him down."

"Yeah but the plan has to change if we are going to do this right." Eliot added in, Parker agreed. "Okay well we will go as planned, we will steal the heirloom but we are going to have a twist."

Nate looked to Sophie. "You are going to have to authentic the statue Leola has an—"

"Uh no, we can have a real person authenticate."

Parker frowned. "But they can spot a fake from miles away. No one is that good."

Leola grinned again. "Who said anything about a fake?" she pulled out the statue and let Nate look over it.

"You mean this is real?" Nate gasped looking up at Leola.

She nodded, still smiling. "It was actually stolen from this very museum in the first place by me."

"Nice." Eliot smiled and Nate frowned again.

"You are selling back the very artefact that was stolen from them?"

She slowly nodded. "Yeah but I think we can do one better."

Sophie caught on, "make them think Joseph stole it."

Hardison laughed. "That could work. I can copy the signatures from the donor bills onto the loan transaction and make them think that the donor bills are fakes."

Nate continued where Hardison left off. "And we can catch Joseph in the act of doing his little scam..."

Where Eliot continued behind Nate, "and we will steal the box and plant it in his car."

Nate stopped, putting his hands up. "That won't be good enough. We are going to need a few other artefacts to make it more real."

"Ah well I thought you might want these." Sophie took out some more files of everyone that had filed a complaint about the switch."

"Ah ok, now this could definitely work." Nate said as he looked to Leola. "Did they ever find anyone who stole that artefact?"

She smirked. "Number one, I was in disguise, number two, I rigged the cameras and number three, I took two artefacts, not one." Counting with her hands.

Parker gasped, pretending to be shocked. "You are so bad!"

"I know I know." Leola pretended to be guilty.

"Alright, then that's the plan." Nate turned to Leola, smiling.

She stopped smiling, now suspicious. "What are you doing?"

"You will see."

* * *

"Oh I can't believe this." Leola grumbled as she walked into the elevator. "That was one of my favourite pieces."

"It's for the greater good. Think of all the people it's going to help." Nate spoke.

"Yeah, yeah. You take BOTH of my prized possessions from this museum." She sighed. "I'm going to have to steal them back later."

Parker squealed. "Oh oh, oh! Can I help?"

Leola laughed. "Sure, we should hang out sometime."

Parker grinned crazily at Eliot who just sighed, shaking his head. "We are trying to make Parker a little more normal. Can you two go see a movie or something first?"

"Why that's no fun." Leola said walking out of the elevator with her box and headed back to Joseph's office.

She walked in and saw a woman with red curly hair, shoulder length. She was surprisingly tall for a woman. She stood up and held out her hand. "Hello my name is Elian Furst."

Leola smiled, setting down the box and introduced herself. As Leola kept them busy with the statue, Eliot and Parker went to the vault to steal some pieces. Dressed like the workers, the vault was already open.

"The vault is already open." Eliot relayed.

Hardison laughed. "That makes our job so much easier now doesn't it?"

"Wait why it is open; what's going on?" Nate asked.

"They must be moving pieces in and out so that they have room for the exhibit." Leola whispered. "They normally station two guards and all you have to do is show your ID that you are a loader or mover."

"Wow this is going to be easy." Parker muttered.

They flashed their ID cards that Hardison had made and began packing the artefacts that belonged to the people who got scammed. After they got them safely into the packing boxes, they headed out to the loading dock.

"We are coming up." Eliot muttered quietly to Hardison. "You have the van?"

"Yep, it's the white one."

Nate and Hardison got changed into security uniforms. Hardison nodded to Nate who got into the driver's seat and drove the dock. They got stopped by security but Hardison gave them a fierce 'we are professionals' look and flashed his badge and they backed off.

They backed up into the dock where Eliot and parker were waiting. They began to quickly load up the van.

Back at the office, Elaine determined the statue to be authentic. "Great." Joseph clapped his hands together. "We can do this right now." He took out a buyer's bill for Leola to sign. She managed to slip trace paper and the donor's bill underneath as Joseph walked Elian to the door.

She quickly filled out the information and slipped the donor's bill into his hands, pretending to take a copy. "Everything in order then?" she nodded. "Allow me to show you around then. I can lock up the office."

She disagreed. "No I think I would prefer it to be locked in the vault." He smiled. "Very well."

They made their way to the elevator again, Joseph carrying the box.

"Whoa what are you doing?" Nate asked. "Parker still has the mobile barcode."

Leola froze. She had forgotten about that. Joseph didn't seem to notice."He didn't notice yet." She whispered.

"Parker, make your way up to the main floor, Sophie, I think you need to meet Joseph on the main floor instead."

Sophie agreed and Parker began to walk fast, her head bowed to avoid eye contact with anyone.

Leola stepped into the evaluator. Joseph came close to her; a little too close. "I think you and I should give it another chance" he whispered, his eyes kind.

She exhaled hard. "Um no thank you Joseph but I don't trust so easily now."

Joseph face tightened and he relaxed quickly giving her a smile. "Alright. Just business at the moment then."

Leola gave an uncertain smile back, feeling uneasy. She knew he hadn't changed. Her memory kept flipping back to the one moment where he'd hit her. She brushed it off, and forced herself to calm down. If anything happened, she could take care of herself; just like she did that one time. He wasn't going to be able to get her a second time. She would make sure of that.

The elevator dinged and she suddenly realized that Joseph had been talking to her the entire time. Flustered, she nodded agreeing to whatever he had just said.

"Hello, Joseph Macarmond I presume?" Sophie came up and Leola couldn't be more relieved.

"Yes I am Joseph, the curator here." Leola took her box form Joseph and he shook Sophie's hand.

"I would like to talk to you about the exhibits and the artefacts you have acquired during your time here."

Leola looked around frantically for Parker. Parker came up behind her, slipping the phone with the mobile barcode into her hand. Leola breathed easily and gave parker a nodded as she headed out of the building.

Leola walked straight over to Joseph and slipped the phone into his pocket and took out his car keys, putting her hand on his waist afterwards. "Joseph, um this box is staring to get heavy, is there any way that I can go myself?"

She asked. Joseph nodded and brushed her off, pointing the way of the vault. What a douche she thought and headed towards the vault.

"Ok I have the car keys." She held them in her hand.

"Ok Eliot should be headed your way." Nate spoke.

Sure enough Eliot was walking towards her and he gave her a confident smile. She smiled back, happy to see him. She slipped the keys in his hand, a tingling feeling stirred inside her as their hands touched. Then he was gone and headed out. She didn't see him look back to glance at her once more before heading off.

"We are almost done. What about you?" Leola said yes, explaining the situation to the security guard standing by the vault as movers continued to walk in and out. One of the e movers took the box for her and out it in. empty handed, she headed back up.

Meanwhile, Sophie was speaking to Joseph. "I would like to see all the transactions you have made recently. There have been quite an increase in donations and the director would like me to have a look see."

Joseph smiled arrogantly and headed to the file room. Sophie said quietly, "he's going in the file room."

The switches have been made?" Hardison asked.

Sophie answered, "Yes. What about you, did you add it to his account?"

"Doing it, annnd done. It's all ready. How about you Parker and Eliot?"

Eliot slammed Joseph's car trunk closed and nodded as Parker grinned. "They are in place."

"Good, okay Eliot you head back in and Parker you meet up with me and Hardison."

They did as planned.

Up in Joseph's office, Sophie looked over the files and began to frown. Joseph began to feel nervous and soon, the director was there.

"Hello, Joseph, we need to talk."

"Sure thing." Joseph eyed the police standing outside his door. "We just received a phone call saying there is fraud and robbery happening under your watch."

Joseph paled. "Really, I mean did you figure out who did it?"

The director asked for the files and Sophie handed them over, slipping the fakes in with the originals.

The director looked at them, his eyebrows rising higher and higher. He called the security in. "what's going on?" Joseph asked.

"You are being arrested for fraud." Joseph shrugged out of the security's grasp angrily and Sophie slipped into the background.

"On what grounds?" he demanded, protesting as a security guard checked his computer.

"These files and transactions? They contain the original and the faked copies. You've been scamming people out of their loans and buyouts. On top of that, we had no knowledge of your latest one until now, one with the Gautama Buddha statue." He paused looking at Joseph.

"Yeah, I just completed that deal."

The director hmphed. "That Gautama Buddha was stolen from here five years ago. On top of that, you have a document stating that it's a donor, not being sold to this museum."

"Bu-bu-but that's impossible." He stuttered. "I watched her sign."

"Sophie, I would slip out of there if you can." Leola spoke, waiting for the guards.

"Watch who"

"Leola givens. She's probably downstairs on the main floor."

The director nodded to one of the guards and Sophie slipped out with them quietly, a smile forming on her face. "We got him." she said quietly.

A few minutes later, Leola rushed into the office, pretending to be confused. "What's going on?" she asked.

"Ma'm, do you have the tax receipt of this donor bill?" the security guard asked.

"Uh no, I have one for a bought transaction, not a donor bill." She handed it to him and he compared the two. She held her breath.

"The donor bill is a fake." He stated.

"What? What is going on?" she asked, angrily.

"This man has been scamming his clients for the last few months." The director explained.

"Wait! Ask her about that statue! She's the one who brought it to me." He jabbed his finger at her accusingly, sure that she was caught.

The director turned around to face Leola.

What about the statue?" she asked.

"That statue was stolen from here five years ago, along with another artefact." The director asked her.

"Oh I got it from a private seller. I paid him six hundred thousand dollars for the statue. He told me it was all legal." She spoke sounding confused. "I never got his name."

"Uh sir?" the guard motioned the director over to Joseph's computer. He glanced at it and looked up and sighed.

"You have six hundred thousand dollars that was put into your account a week ago." He said to Joseph. Joseph was speechless.

"You may go." The director said apologizing to Leola. "Your statue will be returned to you."

"No you know what? You keep that statue." She shrugged. "If it was stolen than you should have it."

The director nodded. "Thank you, your money will be returned then."

She got up to go, when Joseph asked out loud. "Wait where the manager of collections woman/"

The director gave him a look and turned to Leola when she hesitated, her hand on the knob. She bit her lip; she needed to know. "All those people that had been scammed, are they getting their artefacts returned?"

The director smiled, a handsome smile for someone who was balding she noted. "We will go though every transaction he has made during his employment here."

She smiled grateful and gave Joseph a wink. His face contorted with anger and she quickly got out of there.

"Alrighhhht, this actually worked. Great job everyone. Leola head down to the loading dock and meet up with Eliot; we will pick you up there."

"Will do." She walked down the hallway and pressed the elevator button. She heard a crash coming from the office and Joseph came running out.

"Oh crap!" she took off in a dead run down the hallway to the stairs. She could hear the police officers yelling for Joseph to stop.

"What's going?" Nate's asked worried. "The plan fell through?"

"Not exactly!" she screamed, running into the stairwell.

She couldn't stop the memories from flooding back and only two things flashed through her head. One: Joseph wasn't going to hit her again and two: she wanted Eliot here badly. She looked up and down the stairwell and fear flooded through her like ice.

"Oh fudge buckets."

The stairway was isolated and no one was there.

**OOH! Drama on the way...**

**oh be warned, some leola/eliot fluffyness coming soon as well...hehe.**

**Hope you enjoyed this chapter and dont forget to review! :)**

**Next Chapter...up soon...**


	6. Chapter 6

**Hello, here's another chapter.**

**Warning: some fluffyness ahead. (well, an attempt at some fluffyness. If you have an suggestions to make it better, I would be happy to hear it.)**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing of the characters or leverage except for Leola. **

**Just wanted to say thanks to Krismiss, TotalFanGirl and Msmaz for the reviews and I'm glad you like this story. Also thanks to those who added this story to their favourites. :D**

**Enjoy and don't forget to review! **

"Will do." She walked down the hallway and pressed the elevator button. She heard a crash coming from the office and Joseph came running out.

"Oh crap!" she took off in a dead run down the hallway to the stairs. She could hear the police officers yelling for Joseph to stop.

"What's going?" Nate's asked worried. "The plan fell through?"

"Not exactly!" she screamed, running into the stairwell.

She couldn't stop the memories from flooding back and only two things flashed through her head. One: Joseph wasn't going to hit her again and two: she wanted Eliot here badly. She looked up and down the stairwell and fear flooded through her like ice.

"Oh fudge buckets."

The stairway was isolated and no one was there.

**Chapter 6: The deaccession of Joseph Part two**

"Leola!" she heard Joseph scream her name. "You're behind this I know you are! You can't let go what happened five years ago can you! I said I was sorry! But now I'm not, you deserved it." his voice menacingly.

"_Leola what is going on?"_ Hardison asked, worried too. He looked at Parker and Sophie who conveyed the same feelings.

She began running down the stairs. "Uh well, you see I left out some minor details."

"_What are you talking about? What exactly happened between the two of you?" _

Joseph screamed her name again and she heard thumping noises as the guards tried to break down the door he had locked.

"Five years ago, we were together. He cheated on me, I got mad. He beat me up, and then I got back at him with a baseball bat." She spoke quickly. She jumped at the thud noises he was making, jumping down two or three steps at a time.

"Eliot, can you get down here please?" she asked, trying to stay calm.

"_Already on my way."_ Eliot took off in a dead run.

"Leola! You bitch! You ruined my life!" he screamed. The guards were not succeeding in breaking the door down.

"Oh butter sticks." She muttered and took off her heels. She ran and heard him run too as he caught up with her. "I'm gonna kill you!"

She screamed as she missed a step, landing hard and smacking her knee of the ground. She cried out in pain, turning around and blocked the first punch, missing the second. She threw up her foot into his chest pushing him back hard enough to knock him over. Leola got up and took off in a limpy run down the rest of the stairs.

"Eliot are you almost here! I'd like to see your hitter moves sometime soon, as in now!"

"_Almost there! Hang on!"_ He ran, pushing some people out of the way. He didn't think of anything but her.

Joseph was right on Leola's tail. Before she knew it he had caught up with her. He grabbed her by the shirt and slammed her into the wall. "Like I said, you always provoke me." He whispered his voice low and slithery.

She jammed a knee up and hit his groin. He doubled over and she bashed his back with an elbow jab and, she went to run but he grabbed her hand and yanked her back.

She yelled out as her arm nearly got yanked out of the socket. She punched him and he pushed her back off balance.

"You hit me once; you're not going to do it again." She spoke, her voice low and her eyes flashing with anger.

"Ah but where is your trusty bat? Gonna break my arm again?" he taunted.

She laughed. "Nope, got something else for you." Hoping Eliot was going to get here soon.

"Whatever, I know you're behind this. You knew this was my dream job. You would do anything to sabotage me!" he yanked her up and wrapped a hand on her throat. "You caused this bitch." He squeezed but she shoved her arms upwards, knocking his hands off her neck and he raised his hand to punch her but the hit never came. Suddenly he was off his feet and slammed into the floor.

"You don't call her a bitch." Eliot growled as Joseph stood back up. She exhaled violently and inhaled, as she tried to stop the shaking.

Relieved, she limped backwards. "That's my trusty bat. I upgraded." She smiled. "Like it?" relieved that Eliot was here. She knew she shouldn't have ran into the stairwell where there was nothing she could use as a weapon.

Joseph scowled and lunged at Eliot. Eliot sidestepped a punch and grabbed his hand, elbowing him in the chest, spinning around to head butt him and flipped him on the floor.

Joseph laid still and didn't move.

Eliot glowered and brushed his hair out of his face. It wasn't much of a fight. He immediately turned around, concerned. The sound of a door being broken and a lot of clamouring was heard as the police officers ran down the stairs.

"You okay?" Eliot asked, running his hands on her face, neck and arms to make sure nothing was damaged.

"I'm fine." She smacked his hands away.

"Now you know how I feel when you did that to me." He teased.

She laughed. "I guess I do. It's just my knee. He never got a hit on me." She smiled, pleased with that little piece of information.

"Then how did you hurt your knee?" he asked frowning. There was a great big bruise already mottling. She blushed. "I tripped."

He rolled his eyes. Of course. The guards woke up Joseph and took him away in hand cuffs. "You do realize running into a stairwell, you ran yourself into a trap." Eliot muttered quietly.

She glared at him. "Yes I did. I found that out right after I ran in here." She answered annoyed. She didn't want another lecture.

The director came running over. "I'm so sorry. He seemed to have fixated on you and he went wild." He looked her over. "Are you alright?"

"Oh I'm fine." She patted Eliot on the chest. "This good man helped me out." surprised, Eliot smiled. Eliot put a protective arm around her and she felt herself calm down.

"Well good thing then. Do you want to press charges?"

She thought about it and shook her head no. "He has enough charges to put him away. Besides the guards most likely will charge him with assault."

He talked on a radio for a few seconds. "We found his vehicle; it's full of artefacts from the museum." The director shook his head. "From now on, I'm going to check all our employees myself."

They spoke a while longer and Eliot kept his arm around her waist and she limped towards an exit.

* * *

They got back to leverage where Nate was fuming. "Why didn't you tell us he was a maniac? I mean to do a job is one thing but to go after your crazed ex is another thing entirely!"

Eliot handed her an ice pack and she put it on her knee gingerly. "Well if I had told you, would you still have let me do the job?" There was silence. "That's what I thought. Besides I didn't think he would go all David McCall on me." She frowned as the team looked at her shaking their heads.

"Who" Hardison said giving her a puzzled look.

"David McCall, Mark Walberg character in Fear." She paused for a moment looking down at her feet. "What, what if it was your crazed ex, wouldn't you want to have gotten a chance to get them back? Yes. So that's just what I did, that's all."

"What did he mean by the bat?" Parker asked.

"He attacked her once before and she took a bat to him, he went to the hospital for a broken arm and two cracked ribs."

She made an angry face. "Hardison! You hacked my file again!"

"Actually no, this one is was Joseph." He looked closer at the computer. "Your name was mentioned in the police report. Anyways, since you, he had the police called on him four times, all for abuse."

She looked at Nate pointedly. "See?'

Nate rubbed his eyes. "Fine, I see your point." She still looked at him expectantly. "And yes the plan worked out well."

She smiled. "There we go." She also made a face. "I still don't see why you needed to use my other artefact."

Hardison sighed. "For the last time, it makes it all more real."

She grumbled and Sophie smiled. "You still should have told us." She said quietly.

Leola's smiled dimmed. "I know. But I needed to do it. Not Eliot and not anybody else."

Parker nodded, understanding what she meant. Eliot set down his glass and sat down on the couch beside Leola. She became aware of their sides touching. It was very distracting.

"I do have one more question." Hardison said. "What is with all the food and such?"

"what do you mean?" she asked confused.

"Uh you said something like..." he tried to remember what she had said.

"Oh fudge buckets" Parker filled in.

Leola laughed. 'That's my way of swearing. See I used to help manage a home for boys since I was twenty and I knew that they needed a stable person but they did a lot to frustrate me and so naturally I wanted to swear. So instead of actual swear words, I would use fudge buckets, pancakes, falafel trinkets and such." She shrugged half embarrassed. "It stuck with me and I can't seem to stop doing it."

Nate nodded. That made so much more sense.

"Wait, so you didn't grow up in a foster home?" Parker asked.

"No. I grew up in a stable enough homes. My mom and dad are divorced though and have very different views. I still talk to them but not so much in the last six years."

Parker gave a half nod and moved away slightly. She was a bit crestfallen. Not only did she grow up in a good home, she was on the other side of the foster care system.

Nate sighed. "Ok then." He eyed her knee. "You want a ride home?"

She went to decline when Eliot spoke abruptly. "No I'm taking her."

Nate raised an eyebrow and nodded, a small smile played on his lips.

"Okay then." Leola got up. And waved at everyone. "Let me know what happens." She looked at them. "Otherwise I may be forced to steal my artefacts again."

Sophie laughed. "No I'm sure the director will do as he said he would."

Hardison agreed. "However you can't be pulling this bait thing again. That what we got Eliot for." He grinned and Eliot just glared at him.

"Well then next time, I can do that." She laughed. She limped to the door. "Bye Parker."

Parker gave her a curt nod and crossed her arms. Leola felt a twinge of confusion. She didn't know what she did to upset Parker. She would deal with it next time they met. She smiled at Eliot who just gave her a half nod and put his arm around her waist, still glowering.

"I'm not porcelain you know." she pointed out, a little embarrassed.

"Oh yeah? Your knee tells me differently." He said a little angry. "That was a stupid move."

She chuckled. "Oh really? The plan worked didn't it? Beside I know how to take care of myself; I could have done it myself but I wanted to see your mad skills everyone was talking about." She teased, trying to lighten the situation. The look from Eliot told her it wasn't working. Sighing, she got into the passenger side, wincing as she banged her knee on the door.

Eliot got into the driver's side and didn't say anything on the ride over. The deal with Joseph had him disturbed. And she noticed him being quiet and wondered what got into him.

They got to her apartment and she said hi to Fred outside of the building. "oh yeah, before I forget, a man came by with the landlord to see about that apartment across from yours. Though you would want to know." Fred mumbled, walking away as Eliot observed him.

"Oh thanks Fred. I will have some food ready for you soon." She gave him a warm smile and went inside. Eliot rolled his eyes at Leola. She was always willing to help people out, but not herself.

She limped up the stairs one step at a time, refusing to ask for help. She was beginning to get angry herself. If he didn't want to speak to her, then fine, she wouldn't speak to him either.

He huffed; his patience was wearing thin. He scooped her up in his arms despite her protests, and carried her up the stairs.

"Eliot put me down! It's my stupid knee, not a serious injury." She said angrily, trying to get out of his arms, but he had a good grip on her.

He opened the door and set her on the couch. She grumbled, crossing her arms. He had to laugh at her.

"What are you laughing at? I will shoot you with one of my darts." She threatened.

He went to glare but stopped short. He was confused. He didn't want to scare her; especially since the whole thing with the ex and that what Eliot did for a living was aggressive. Heck he was the definition of aggression. He muttered to himself instead, looking in the fridge for something to make.

She limped to her bedroom and heard Eliot rummaging through her cupboard. She felt a pang of irritation run though her. He was really annoying her. She knew she made a mistake but she had figured the police officers to restrain him. It's not her fault that he broke loose...and chased after her...and tried to attack her...but he's still going to jail and that counts right? She grumbled to herself, groaning quietly as she shrugged off her clothes and put on a loose shirt and a pair of short shorts. She ran her fingers through her hair and sighed as she limped back out to the kitchen to see Eliot shaking a box of hot tamales.

"You know you can try one." She said, crossing her arms with a smile on her face. He gave her a sheepish glance before setting them down. "no thanks, I don't even know what they are."

"It's hot cinnamon candy." She limped over to her cupboard, pulling out a glass and water from the tap.

Eliot took advantage of her back being turned to examine her for any other injuries she might have not told him about. Then he noticed how soft her hair looked in the light and how her shirt slipped off one shoulder exposing her skin. He looked away quickly knowing where it was going to lead him if he didn't. He still needed to talk to her about what the heck was going on between them. He needed to know.

She drank her water and hopped up on the counter, groaning as she put ice on her knee. It may be superficial damage but it still hurt.

He leaned on the other counter, crossing his arms and tried to think of a way to explain what he was feeling.

She popped a hot tamale in her mouth, noticing the stare she was being given. "Can I help you?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

Eliot continued to stare. He took a deep breath, rubbing his eyes. "Leola, we need to talk."

"If it's about the ex boyfriend thingy, or the stairwell choice, I know, bad choices, bad ideas, don't do them again."

He shook his head and frowned. "Well that is a problem too but that's not what I was talking about."He watched her reaction closely as she hesitated but popped tamale in her mouth. He found himself wanting to kiss her badly. He was distracted by her, the essence of her as she merely sat there eating the damn hot tamales. Again, he forced himself out of his fantasy.

"About that boyfriend, well yes that is what I want to talk about, um; you shouldn't be taking guys like him on. You don't have the training."

"Oh yeah?" she raised her eyebrow and pointed to her cupboard. "I have a trusty frying pan who disagrees. And a bat in the closet who also disagrees." She ate another hot tamale and Eliot wished she would stop. "I can take care of myself. Not the first time I have been in a fight situation and it won't be the last." Eliot went to speak but she stopped him. "And no they are all not boyfriends either. He was the only one. He's the reason I stole from that museum in the first place."

"Wait, you stole the two artefacts because of him." he looked at her in disbelief.

"Well yeah. It was his dream place to work and I don't know why that was, as you can see it was very easy to pull a con there and beside that point, if I can help people, I will. And sometimes I end up in those situations."

Eliot looked at her. "Yeah but you don't have the training. You should leave it to people who can handle it."

"Oh really? So I should have left you that night we met right? Is that what you're saying? I managed to cover our asses pretty well didn't I?" she glared, eating another hot tamale.

Eliot sighed. She did have a point there. She could take care of herself-and other people but...it seemed as if she sets herself up as bait in order to lure in the predator to kill. Heck, that's most likely what he would have done.

"Okay yes that situation fine, but this Joseph thing...well...you can't do that." He couldn't say what he meant. He didn't even know what he meant.

"Oh really? Because I don't have the training. I see. I can't fight because I have no training, no thanks." She was getting edgy. "He only managed to throw one punch. That was it, one punch and I put HIM in the hospital with a broken arm and two cracked ribs. I made sure it was the last punch he threw on me. And today, none of his blows connected. I made darn sure it wouldn't happen again."

"And how does it affect you now?" he asked quietly, his point coming to the conversation.

She hesitated and put her tamales down. "You mean how it affects my life and how I trust people." She stated. Eliot gave a small nod. Her heart softened. She understood where he was coming from now. She gave him a warm smile, catching his eyes so that he would know she was telling the truth.

"It was only one guy Eliot. It wasn't like I let guys who are aggressive and abusive or violent into my life all the time."

A pained expression flickered on his face as soon as she said violent but then his face returned to neutral. She saw it though and the pain was clear in his eyes.

It wasn't what she wanted to say. She wanted Eliot in her life. She wanted the team in her life too. It suddenly dawned on her what was bugging Eliot.

"You think that you are violent." she said and it wasn't a question.

The look in his eyes told her she was right. She took a deep breath and got down from the counter, putting the ice bag back in the freezer. She walked over and put a hand on his arm and leaned up to his ear to whisper. He tensed up but waited.

"I knew what type of man you were when I first met you Eliot. Your eyes told me who you truly are. That why I went back for you. That why we are still in contact to this day. You're not violent. There is too much violence in that word to even describe you. You're...in control. You deal out what is needed, nothing more."

He looked away and she put a hand on his cheek forcing him to look at her. He saw the understanding in her eyes and exhaled, trying to give her a smile.

"Okay" she asked softly. He nodded. He put his hand on top of hers and gently squeezed. She couldn't help but feel a little heated from the warmth of his hand.

"I am who I am and you are who you are. I deal with things as they come along, nothing more, nothing less." Then she reached up and kissed him. She pulled back smiling at the shocked look he had on his face.

"You do realize you can speak anytime soon right?" the playful look coming back into her eyes.

"Yeah, but It was your turn to talk." He smiled. He watched her feeling incredibly relieved. She wasn't like the other women he had in his life.

Patting him on the arm, she turned around and hopped back on the counter. "So. What are you making me to eat?"

He crossed him arms giving her a playful glare. "What makes you think I'm going to make you anything?"

"Well seeing how you think I can't do anything with this knee and you're such a good guy and all, it's the type of thing you would do." She answered, batting her eyelashes at him sweetly.

He rolled his eyes and pulled out some pancake mix from the cupboard he had rummaged through earlier. 'Right."

"Pancakes?" she raised an eyebrow. "Seriously? Going to show off you pancake skills?" she shook her at him, pretending to be disappointed.

"What are you talking about? You want them?'

"Oh yeah I will have some. I can never make them. They always come out kablooey looking." She used her hands to try to show him what she meant.

He looked at her weirdly but she looked serious. "I don't believe you. Come here. I will watch every step you do."

She sighed but obliged. "You are going to be surprised."

A half an hour later Eliot gave up. "I don't know what you are doing! I mean you did it the EXACT same way as me and they are quite..." he looked at her pancakes, a little grossed out.

"Yeah yeah I know. I tried telling you. You wanted me to make them." She laughed at his facial expression.

She flipped her pancakes expertly into the garbage can. She turned around and handed her spatula to him. "You want to give it a shot?"

"Yeah I think should take over." He put his hair up in a pony and moved over to the stove. She rooted through her fridge for eggs and sausage.

"Oh can you get me the frying pan? The bent one though. It works the best."

Eliot grabbed it out of the cupboard and handed it to her. His hand touched her again and Leola's senses went on fire. She turned around and began cracking the eggs. Eliot hesitated and started his pancakes.

She knew she shouldn't have kissed him. Now everything he did was distracting. It was quiet except for the loud sizzling of the sausage and eggs and the aroma from the food was amazing.

They talked about the con they had just pulled, though Eliot was careful not to mention Joseph. Then they talked about cons that Eliot's team had pulled, including everyone from the Nigerian job to the mile high job. She was impressed with some of the things they had pulled off. Soon the food was cooking and Eliot was surprised at how easy it was talking to her. She didn't mind some of the fights he had been in, though she winced as he explained some of the injuries he'd gotten. He even showed her some of the moves when she asked him how to do them. She laughed when he told her about Parker and her fear of horses and that she ate fortune cookies for breakfast and stabbed a target with a fork. He even told her about his love for the countryside, though he skimmed the subject on Aimee. She caught on but didn't push it any further to his relief. Soon the food was done.

He flipped the pancakes onto a plate and set it on the other counter, turning off the stove. Leola did the same and peered at his pancakes.

"Hmm. You do cook good looking pancakes."

Eliot laughed. "Just wait until you try them." He put some glasses on the table and set the two plates on the table as well. She grabbed the forks and knives and limped over, hiding the pain as she sat down. Her leg still throbbed like crazy and when she glanced at it, the bruise now covered her entire knee and began spreading to her thigh.

She sighed and waited for Eliot. Eliot walked over and looked at her, eyeing the leg she tried to hide from his view. He stopped at the freezer pulling out another ice pack and walked over, motioning her to put her leg up on the chair. She rolled her eyes and did as he asked. Gently, he examined it and then put the ice on it. She felt her senses tingling as he handled her softly with care, cautious enough not to cause any pain.

"That is some bruise though. You still have some swelling." He observed as he sat down.

"Yeah yeah, its fine. Watch and see." They ate in comfortable silence. She finished her eggs and took a small cautious bite of her pancakes. "MMM. You're right; your pancakes are really good." She took a gigantic bite.

He laughed his eyes soft. He looked at her once more smiling before digging into his own plate. After they ate, they both got up to clear. She washed the dishes and he dried. He stole glances at her and each time she looked at him, he quickly looked away. She Smirked, amused by this. He smiled too, just content. It wasn't often he didn't have a sore arm or an injury. She took a sideways glance at him and handed him a plate to dry.

"You should know where that goes."

Eliot grinned, nodding as he put it away in the cupboard.

She began to wonder why he was smiling so much. "Eliot."

"Yeah?"

"Why have you been grinning like an idiot for the past twenty minutes?" She smiled when his grin dropped and he looked into her eyes to see she was picking on him.

"I'm not grinning like an idiot. I haven't been grinning like an idiot." He grinned again and she did the same.

"And besides you're grinning like an idiot yourself so I wouldn't talk if I were you."

She scoffed, pretending to be insulted. "I don't grin like an idiot." She sniffed. "I am a proper lady I am." She bowed her head then stuck her nose high up in the air. Eliot laughed loudly nearly dropping the plate in his hand.

"No you're not. You're not a proper lady at all, I'm sorry."

"Wait what do you mean. I am a lady. I can be a lady." She frowned.

"No you're not." He laughed and shook his head at her. "Number one, ladies don't tackle men that are twice her size." She tried to protest but he spoke louder and she just grumbled.

"Number two, ladies don't jump out windows into ice cold water and ladies don't understand the work thieves do." He spoke the last part softly. She sighed dramatically pretending to be defeated.

"I suppose you're right." She suddenly remembered something. "Hey uh, earlier today you told Joseph not to call me a bitch." She hesitated. "If I recall correctly, isn't that what you first thought of me too?"

He blinked looking away and back at her trying to think of a reason. "Well uh, yes I did um." Then he remembered. "But you see darling, someone once told me first impressions don't mean a thing." He smiled softly. "I think she's right."

Her heart thudded and she exhaled. She dropped the frying pan back into the soapy water and took one step and kissed him. "You are a wise man Eliot Spencer." She whispered giggling.

He chuckled, his breath warm on her cheek. He kissed her this time, wrapping his hands around her waist pulling her closer to him. She responded and ran her hands through his hair before wrapping her arms around his neck. He walked forward until her back hit the counter. He lifted her up and sat her down. She ran her hands down his back as he kissed her neck. She kissed him again as he ran his hands down her leg. Suddenly she hissed and jerked back.

"Oh shoot sorry." He immediately moved his hand from her leg. He had forgotten about her injured knee. He cursed at himself and she just laughed.

"I had too." She rested her forehead against his and sighed, her hands on his biceps.

He ran his fingers up and down her arm softly, his breathing getting slower.

She opened her eyes and asked, "Want to watch a movie?"

He laughed; it was kind of out of the blue. "Sure why not."

She hopped down from the counter and made a face at the leftover dishes in the sink. "I'll do those later, sometime...maybe tomorrow." She grinned.

"Go grab a movie." She said and limped to the freezer as he went to her living room, eyeing all the books she had all over the place. "Do you even have movies under these books?' he asked, thinking no.

He heard her laugh in the kitchen. "Yeah check the bookcase to your left. And shove any books that are on the couch on the floor."

He looked and sure enough, they littered the couch. Picking up one he read the cover. It was by Dean Koontz. He shook his head and brushed them off the couch and went over to her bookstand. She had tons of movies ranging from chic flicks to action to horror. A lot of horror. He heard her limp in. "uh which one do you want to see?" he asked, not sure.

"hmm. Choose an action flick."

He looked at them panicked. He grabbed one and put it in the DVD player. He sat down at the end of the couch, his arm resting above. She stood there a moment biting her lip shyly before sitting beside him and leaning in. he was happy to be there, even if it was to watch a movie.

"What movie did you pick?" she asked, as the trailers came on.

"Uh." He picked up the cover to look at it. "Inside man."

She laughed. "Of course you did." He smiled and she rested her head on his shoulder and relaxed as he put his arm around her. She put the ice pack on her knee and sighed happily.

Eliot began to whisper what he would have done differently in the movie and stroked her arm softly. Before she knew it, she had fallen asleep. Eliot watched the movie until his eyes began to slowly close. He leaned back into the couch, shifting Leola slightly and got comfortable. He grabbed the blanket on top of the couch and threw it over them. He looked down at her to see her sleeping peacefully and smiled tiredly. "Sleep tight." He whispered. He closed his eyes and went to sleep himself, a small smile still on his lips.

**Hoped you liked it!**

**Next chapter should be up soon...I've been writing nonstop hehe. The show is just too amazing.**

**Please Review!**


	7. Chapter 7: The day after

**Author's note: I'm going back to school this week so I won't be able to update as often as I would like. I will try to update every week, at the latest two weeks. **

**Disclaimer: I dont own anything but Leola. :)**

**Thanks TotalFanGirl! I'm glad you liked the ending of Ch 6 :D**

**Enjoy and Dont forget to review! ;)**

Leverage Ch 7

Leola opened her eyes to the sun blinding her. She groaned and threw the blanket over her head. She was warm and she snuggled in. it was funny that her bed was moving up and down. Maybe it was like those dreams where you're in a fast moving vehicle and it seems so real...

"morning." Eliot's gruff voice came from beneath her.

Her eyes opened wide. "Huh?" She shot straight up, the blanket flying off and landing on the floor.

"I said morning." He smiled.

She looked down to see they were still clothed. "Oh thank god." She mumbled, fearing that she had done something premature.

"Excuse me?" Eliot said, propping himself up on his elbows. "I've never had a girl thank god for using me as a pillow before."

"Well you are really comfy." She giggled, feeling her cheeks heat up.

"Oh yeah? Comfy enough for a morning kiss you think?" he teased; his hair mussed up and slightly tangled.

She pretended to think about it, making Eliot smile. "Most definitely." She said, leaning in and pushing her lips on his gently.

He deepened the kiss, taking a hand and ran it through her hair. "mmm." She smiled, getting onto Eliot's lap.

She pulled back, smiling and looked happily into his eyes. "Morning."

"I think we went through this already." He brushed a tangled strand of hair out of her face. She sighed and kissed his on the forehead and then his lips.

Hopping off, she headed to the bathroom, leaving Eliot on the couch. "You said morning. I didn't say anything."

He gave a small disbelieving laugh. He was surprised; though he really should expect it from her. A few moments later, she came back out, stretching as she made her way to the kitchen. His eyes trailed up and down her body and landed on the big black bruise on her knee. Suddenly he remembered. Walking over, he turned her around gently as she protested, trying to get milk out of the fridge. Examining it, he saw the swelling had indeed gone down and all that was left was a bruise.

Looking down, she rolled her eyes and grumbled. "I told you its fine. I'm a nurse remember? Jeez."

He just mumbled grumpily to himself, trying to grab some coffee instead. She laughed at his expression and had to give him a hug. She wrapped her arms around him and pulled him close, kissing him. She let go after a minute, seeing that he was in a better mood.

"I should go get dress" she laughed stretching up and pushing her lips in to his one last time before heading off to get dressed.

Eliot watched her leave and shook his head. After she got dressed and Eliot cleaned himself up, they decided to head over to Nate's to see what was happening with the team. Leola's mind floated back to Parker and she knew she needed to deal with today.

She walked out of her apartment and nearly ran into someone. "Oh sorry."

The man laughed, carrying two boxes, precariously placed on top of one another.

"Here let me help with this." She took one of the boxes before he had a chance to object. She stood there, waiting for him to lead the way. Surprising her, he led her to the apartment directly across from hers. Eliot stepped out and closed the door before settling his eyes on the man. Immediately he didn't like him. It astonished him how sure he felt that he didn't like this man. Leola paid no attention, carrying the box in for him. He set is down and stuck out his hand. "Ned. I just moved in here."

She shook his hand. "I'm Leola. I live across the hall." He had dark brown hair with equally dark brown eyes. His handshake was firm and he was about a half a head taller than Eliot.

Ned looked at Eliot who seemed to shooting daggers at him with his eyes. "And who's this?"

Leola looked back and made a face at Eliot who continued to shoot the stink eye at him. "That's Eliot. He's...a friend of mine."

She found herself wondering if Eliot and her were a couple yet or not. She brushed the thought back and Eliot came to stand protectively behind her, crossing his arms.

Ned nodded his head slowly, feeling uncomfortable under Eliot's glare. Leola sighed, and said nice to meet you before going, Eliot following. As soon as they were outside, Eliot spoke. "I don't like him."

She huffed. "Come on. Everyone deserves at least one chance. And besides he's a neighbour. If he crosses a line, he will definitely hear it from me."

She took his arm and dragged him to his truck. Eliot climbed in inside and began the drive back over to leverage. He parked the truck and smiled at her for a moment, feeling happier than he had in a long time. She blushed, giving him a smile. "You're grinning like an idiot again."

He laughed and got out of the truck. "You are too."

She smiled, knowing it was the truth. She was happy.

They took the elevator up and walked in, to find Parker sitting crossed legged on the couch, Hardison sitting at the counter and Sophie was sitting in the chair.

"Hey guys. What's up" Hardison greeted them. She greeted them back and turned to Parker.

"Hey Parker. How are you?" she asked, walking over the couch and sitting down.

Parker crossed her arms; muttering "fine" then got up and walked into the meeting room.

Leola felt hurt by Parker's reaction, but for the life of her she couldn't figure what she had done to make Parker so upset. Eliot noticed and walked over with a cup of coffee in his hand. He held it out for her and she took it, nodding a thanks.

Leola said good morning to Sophie, relieved that it was only Parker who seemed to be upset with her. Then she thought of Nate and wondered if he was just as upset. She began to panic but her fears dissipated as Nate walked in, and mumbled a good morning, grabbing a coffee. She saw Sophie's worried face however, and Leola wondered how far Nate's drinking really went. She went to say something to Sophie when Parker walked back in, avoiding Leola, at all costs. When Leola went into the kitchen and sat down, Parker went out and sat on the couch. She sighed and leaned against the counter, not realizing that Nate was studying her. She surveyed the kitchen and finally saw Nate drinking his coffee, looking at her thoughtfully.

"Something wrong Nate?" she asked, raising an eyebrow. He shook his head no.

"Just thinking. I chased them down at one point or another in my career." He waved his coffee to the team before turning his attention back onto her. "But I cannot remember if I ever chased you."

She grinned and thought for a moment. Smiling she nodded. "Yes you have chased me before." She leaned in and counted with her fingers. "Janice blossom, Nadine Gale, Alexa Jordan and Jonathon Reesor.' He did a double take. He only focused on one name.

"Jonathon Reesor? He was a bigger guy, not slender." He eyed her figure to prove his point.

She laughed at Nate's expression. "Yes I know. That body suit was expensive but you were getting close on my trail so I had to throw you off." She shrugged.

"Yeah, I remember those names now. But really Jonathon Reesor?" he couldn't fathom it.

"Yes. It worked didn't it?" she whispered before Hardison came over to the fridge and pulled out his orange pop.

He saw Nate's eyebrows go up. "What?" Hardison asked.

"I need more coffee." Nate muttered, refilling his cup. Leola laughed and went back out to the living room.

Parker glanced at her before quickly glancing away. Leola slightly frowned, her thoughts racing through what had happened yesterday. Then it hit her; Parker moved away as soon as Leola gave them her old job occupation. She studied Parker and wondered if she grew up in the bad side of the child care system. Sophie walked out into her office and a few minutes later Parker followed her.

Perturbed, she looked around for Eliot and found him in his office. He smiled instantly when she walked in but then he saw that she was troubled. She tried to explain, but her brain was blank. Eliot took her hand and grabbed his jacket. He hollered he was going out and ignored Hardison's witty remark.

She followed him, smiling as he kept her hand in his. They began to walk down the block and it was silent before Eliot spoke. "What's the matter darling?" he asked, squeezing her hand gently. She took one glance at him and told him everything. About Parker avoiding her and why she thought it was and that she didn't know what to do. He listened attentively, nodding as she went through her problem. "Okay. Well then if you believe that is her problem, why not take her to your old job and show her that you are not what she thinks you are." He looked at her and smiled. "Knowing you, you probably still go back there every once in a while for a visit. Right?"

She had to think for a second. He was right; she did go back every once in a while to help out and visit. It was her job before nursing and she loved it, no matter how crazy the boys drove her. She smiled, looking up at Eliot. She cupped his face and kissed him. He wrapped a hand around her waist and pulled her closer, and smiled when they broke apart.

He kissed her forehead. "Let's head back."

* * *

Parker followed Sophie into her office. She stood there, a weird look on her face. She wanted to ask Sophie what she would do in a situation like this. Sophie brought her out of her thoughts. "What's wrong Parker? I saw you avoiding Leola. I thought you guys were friends."

"Well, we were...or are..." she trailed off, frowning as she tried to think. She felt betrayed or hurt by Leola's old job. Leola working as a manager for a boy's home was almost the same thing as foster care except it's a group home and for boys only but sti—

"What is it Parker?" Sophie asked, worried since Parker seemed to get more confused.

Parker hesitated, not sure how to go forward with it. "I feel betrayed." She blurted out.

Sophie walked over concerned. "What do you mean? Who betrayed you?" She became protective and felt angry.

"Well...I guess she didn't betray me but it feels like It." Parker frowned, confused. "I don't know. Maybe that's not right." Sophie took a moment to process this. She had no idea what Parker could be thinking and she didn't want to push her. Waiting, Parker start to speak. "You see, its Leola. She, well...didn't grow up like me. She was on the other side of the foster care system sort of thing. It's just bugging me." She looked down at her hands and avoided Sophie's eyes.

Sophie breathed relieved. She thought it was something worse. She had seen Parker's reaction when Leola told them her old job. She sat down beside Parker and gave her a soft nudge. "Many people come from many lives and can end up the same way." she spoke softly. "But you see her as one of the bad guys who hurt you." Parker nodded, taking in a shaky breath. Sophie thought about it. Leola definitely wasn't a bad guy here. She was very kind and helping, even making friends easily with Parker; which wasn't always so easy. "Well, you became quick friends and you offered a fortune cookie to her the first night we met her. You didn't do that to us; your team so she must be good somehow right?" Parker thought and agreed. "And even though you threw her off a building, she still wants to be friends and on top of that, she said you and her can go steal some artefacts together right?" Parker agreed again. "She's understanding, kind and well, has your type of thinking sometimes." Parker smiled at the last part. "You only have a problem with her job. So why don't you ask her about it? Maybe she can prove she isn't the bad you think her to be."

Parker looked at her finally and nodded. "You're right. You always know what to do." Parker patted her on the head. Hopping up, she smiled, the confusion disappearing from her eyes. "Thanks."

Sophie gave her a smile back. "No problem Parker. I'm glad you trust me with this problem. With that Parker walked out of her office.

* * *

Eliot and Leola reached the office again and he stole a kiss from her, lighting her senses on fire. Then her phone rang and she grumbled. "Always in the middle of something good."

Eliot laughed. "you might as well answer it." he kissed her once more. "I will meet you inside Nate's." She nodded, watching him leave, appreciating the view. She flipped open her phone to check caller ID but it was private. Sighing she answered.

"Hey is this Leola? It's Gregory from Russia." A man with a thick heavy accent spoke.

She searched her brain and remembered him. "Yes I remember you. You hired me for the ambassador job. How can I help you?"

"I have another job offer for you. It's in three days but you will need to fly over to Germany."

She paused, thinking. She would be gone for at least a week, and depending on the job; if anything likes the last one, should be a breeze, if not fun. She smiled. "I'm in."

She talked to him for another five minutes as he described the job, the risks and the target. Afterwards, she said goodbye and hung up the phone. She smiled, beginning to feel excited as she always loved pulling jobs.

She started thinking of the materials and gadgets she needed and felt her excitement dampen. It would be a lot of work. She opened the door, thinking maybe Hardison could help her with some things she needed for the job.

She walked in and Hardison startled her, arguing with Eliot. "Just because I know technology doesn't mean I cannot get the ladies! Ladies love the smart dudes" he argued.

Eliot rolled his eyes.

"This is the geek age baby. The geeks are hot. Not fighter muscle I-hit-when-somebody-makes-me-mad guy." He saw Leola. "Isn't that right Leola? Come on give me a hand here."

Eliot burst out laughing, and Hardison eyes pleaded with her. She couldn't say no.

"Well technically, yes geeks are hot, especially with all your gadgets and stuff but the men who are more rugged and charming takes the cake too." She shrugged. "I'm thinking it's tied."

Both Hardison and Eliot frowned. It was silent so she quickly slipped in the kitchen before they could bombard her with another take-a-side question. She hated those and she always tried to make it even. Suddenly Parker hopped in front of her and Leola skidded to a stop, almost running her over. "Hello Parker." She was flustered and tried to get her thinking straight. "I've been meaning to ask something-"

"I disagree with what you did or do." Parker interrupted.

Leola frowned. "Okay um, is this about the child care thing?" Parker nodded. Leola smiled at her now. "Well, since you didn't exactly grow up in good foster homes during your childhood, I can see why you think I am on the wrong side." Again, Parker nodded. "I'm going there in a couple days for the day and I would like you to come with me and see what I do for them." She held her breath hoping.

Parker paused and nodded suspiciously. "Sounds good." She waved at her and walked away, leaving Leola standing there confused.

She shook her head to think about the whole conversation and finally made it to the kitchen. Then she remembered that she needed Hardison to help her out. She sighed and braced herself as she headed back out into the living room where Eliot and Hardison were still arguing. This time however, it was about who could break into the white house faster.

"Hey, I could hack them in about ten minutes right now. You would have to charm some ladies, grift and on top of that find passports and ID's and a way in- without my help. I would win right off the bat."

"Ah but I would still get the ladies." Eliot smiled triumphly while Hardison got more frustrated. Leola frowned, not liking the fact that Eliot was talking about ladies and she raised an eyebrow at him. He shrugged. "Just proving a point."

She nodded sarcastically and turned to Hardison. "Right now, the geek wins ok? I need your help."

Hardison cackled and clapped his hands. "What'd I tell ya? The geek wins Eliot. Not the punch happy bully."Eliot scowled, clearly not happy. She hesitated; laughing thinking she should kiss him but thought better of it. She would do that later. Instead she winked at him and followed Hardison to the meeting room and he flipped his six panel computer screen on. "What's up?"

"I need a new passport, ID and I need to be able to get into the country without raising any flags and on top of that, I was wondering if you had a device that could disband the frequencies of radios as well at the wireless cameras set in a museum. Also, it would have to take the frequencies and convert it into my own so that I can keep an eye and loop the cameras."

Hardison looked at her and scoffed. "That's easy."

Leola winced; she still didn't give the worse part. "Ah but it needs to be undetectable, not to be traced or be on a computer even. Maybe a phone which can give or take phone calls but have a site with no IP address."

Hardison stopped scoffing and looked her like she had ten heads. "Ok, well I'm gonna need to build something but why on earth you need something like that?"

She shrugged. "I got a job and I need to steal the zadonshchina- which is a poem explaining the Mongols' defeat in 1380. My client feels that it needs to be stolen to prove their security sucks."

Hardison frowned, shaking his head wondering how he knew it was for a job. "And where is this?"

"Right now, it's in Germany but I need to get it back to Russia."

Hardison whistled. "That's going to be hard."

She disagreed, "not really if you could whip up what I need." She said sweetly.

Hardison sighed as if it would be a lot of work but rubbed his hands together. "I'm on it."

She thanked him and went over to Nate and told him about the job she was going to take. Nate nodded. "That's fine. I think we might have a new client soon anyways so." She smiled, and waved goodbye to everyone. Eliot caught her eyes and she blushed, her heart fluttering. she turned and rested her hand on the doorknob, hesitating. She wanted to say something to Eliot badly but wasn't sure where their relationship status was.

Eliot immediately got up; thinking now was the time and walked over nonchantly. He could feel his team's eyes on him. He turned her around and kissed her, his arms around her. He felt her smile and knew it was the right move.

"whoa!, wasn't really expect that." Hardison stood shocked. "Aw come on, Leola you were supposed to be on my side not his." He sat down disappointed.

Nate looked at Sophie who looked at him, a small smile on her lips.

Leola opened her eyes to see Eliot's eyes twinkle. He looked over to Hardison as she opened the door, her hand slipping in his. "I still get the ladies."

Leola laughed and Hardison's arguing could be heard down the hall. She leaned into Eliot as they walked to the elevator. Now, she knew exactly where they stood.

**Not my best chapter but it will get better, I promise :)**

**Please Review! I would love to hear from you. :)**


	8. Chapter 8: Leola's past

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except for Leola. :)**

**Enjoy and don't forget to review! :)**

**Chapter 8: Leola's past**

A couple days later, Leola and Parker made their way to the boys' group home. Parker sat tense in the passenger seat with the music on full blast. Leola sighed; hoping things would change once she had spent the day with her. Any small talk always ended with a curt answer, stopping the flow.

Soon they reached the place. "Welcome to the boys' home. It called the kind hearted but it's more like hell once you step inside." She joked but realized it was definitely the wrong thing to say judging by the expression on Parker's face. "It was a joke...kind of"

She received another look from Parker. "You will know what I mean once you step inside, I swear." Leola insisted, knowing she was digging a deeper hole.

"I see." Parker got out of the car and stared up at the big house. It was one of those old wooden houses and it weirded Parker out a bit.

She felt the hair stand up on the back of her neck. She followed Leola to the door and Leola gave her a crazy excited grin before opening the door.

"HEY EVERYONE!" Leola hollered, walking in and setting her purse in a cupboard; the doors squeaking loudly as she closed them. Parker looked around her cautiously.

Suddenly the thundering sound of running footsteps was heard. "Hey Leo is back!" a young boy with wild red curly hair yelled. He threw himself at Leola who wrapped him in a big hug.

"Hey Justin." She smiled.

Then there were five boys. Parker stood there, wide eyed taking in the whole scene.

"Hey boys." She laughed looking at them all. "How have things been? Still wreaking havoc on the new girl?"

A woman came in, looking so stressed Parker could swear her hair was standing on end. Leola answered her own question as the boys smiled evilly.

"Go play." She shooed them away, patting the woman on the back sympathetically. "It gets better." the woman looked at her hopeful. "You lose part of your sanity but it gets better."

The woman scowled and walked outside muttering about the trouble wasn't worth it. Leola stifled a laugh and glanced at Parker whose lips were slightly upturned. "Hey Parker, wanna help me? I just have to uh, clean up this mess a bit." eyeing the granola wrappers on the table, the unwashed dishes and the laundry piling in the corner of the other room.

Parker nodded, her face breaking out into a smile. They cleaned up and the other boys who didn't greet them could be heard, whooping as they played a video game.

"So this is what you did?" Parker asked, in doubt as she dried a pan.

Leola nodded. "Yep. They come from families that neglect or abuse them. Some stay while others go home." She shrugged handing Parker another dish. "Either way, it's a place for them to be themselves."

Parker nodded slowly, questioning her judgement.

Leola suddenly stiffened as a cupboard squealed. "Zack put back my purse." The cupboard squeaked quickly and Leola grinned. Without turning around Parker saw her greet an older looking boy who put his hands in his pockets sheepishly. Looking at Parker, she explained.

"This how I knew you would go through my purse. He's a pickpocket too." Parker smiled, glancing at the boy. "Hey Zack how are you doing?" Leola walked over pulling him into a hug. "This is Parker, Parker this is Zack."

Parker shook his hand and smiled again. "So you pick pockets then?"

Zack nodded. "Locks too."

"Hmm. Wanna have a contest?" Parker asked a little excited.

Zack glanced at Leola who sighed and nodded. "But I don't want you to teach the others how to do It." she warned.

Zack grinned. "Why not? I taught you didn't I?"

He laughed and Parker looked back at Leola eyes full with questions. "Later later." She waved away Parker's unspoken questions. She hesitated and looked at her. "If you really want to know, ask him. He's the reason I really got into break-ins."

"Ah but you had the taste for it didn't you?" Zack retorted and he waved Parker to follow him down the hall to another room. Parker's mind swirled with questions but right now, she had competition.

Leola giggled as Parker ran after Zack. She went back to cleaning the dishes as her memories came back. Zack had been the one to torture her beyond any of the other kids. He wouldn't listen; he always argued with her, started fights AND stole her things. She smiled shaking her head humming. Yeah, Zack was the one who made her lose her mind.

Suddenly she was jarred into real time when a boy yelled "EWWWWW!" she cringed and braced herself. She ran into the hallway connecting with the living room where a boy who looked green, had a nice big pile of puke in front of him.

"He puked!" another boy pointed, looking green himself. "Ok, I see it. Please go outside then Hun." She quickly ushered him out before he puked as well.

She took a deep breath, giving the sick boy a warm smile.

"I don't feel so good." He whined, tugging at her heart. She put a hand to his forehead and discovered he had a fever. "Okay sweetie. Let's get you into a bed. You staying here?" He nodded and allowed her to direct him upstairs. "What's your name?" She asked soothing his embarrassment.

"Philip" he answered. He looked to be about the age of ten.

She passed a room and found Parker and Zack furiously picking at locks. She sighed. "Uh Zack, where this little guy's bed?"

"The third on the right." He replied not even looking up.

She ushered him into his room and he laid in bed as she pulled the covers up over him. She sat down and gently brushed his brown curly hair off his face. "Sorry for getting sick." He mumbled his eyes getting heavy.

"No worries Hun. Just a bit of cleaning and you won't know it's ever been there."

He drifted off to sleep and she closed the door half way. Walking back down the stairs, she heard the thundering of the boys' feet.

"Zack don't let anybody up here." He didn't reply but she knew he heard her. She cleaned it up and scrubbed the floor down completely, putting the towels and cloths in the wash. She scrunched her nose at the mountain of dirty laundry. She sorted it and put a load of darks in the other wash. Checking the time, she saw it was nearing lunchtime. Going to the kitchen, she began to prepare homemade hamburgers and some salad and home fries.

Upstairs, competition was getting serious. Parker worked quickly through her third lock frantically and slapped the timer. "HAHA! Still the best WHOO!" she threw her hands up in triumph and Zack groaned.

"Well you are definitely good." He shook her hand, smiling.

She nodded. "I know."

He barked out a laugh. "Well not so modest are you?" he shook his head again and she laughed. "So how do you know Leola?" he asked.

She fumbled with the lock as she spoke. "I uh...work with her...you know..."

Zack grinned. "Yeah, she still thieving?" he raised an eyebrow. "She never stopped since."

Parker became curious. "And you? How do you know her?"

Zack laughed. "Are you kidding me? I was here when she first worked at this place. I gave her HELL. I poured juice in her purse, stole her wallet, slipped vinegar in the food she was cooking and her coffee, started fights." He shrugged. "She began swearing like crazy and then suddenly it turned into things like..." he thought for a minute trying to recall.

"Butter sticks and fudgy buckets?" Parker added, hoping to help. His eyes lighted up with recognition. "Yes! Those types."

"Yeah, anyways, I began to see she was little different. We drove her and the other workers crazy but she still plowed through whatever we threw at her. She brought books or sport equipment when we asked for it and didn't get it. She gave activites and such. She caught me one time when I slipped my hand in her pocket to steal her cell phone for the umpteenth time." Zack smiled. "She grabbed my hand and I was sure she was going to raise hell. Instead, she asked me how I did that. So I taught her."

Parker nodded slowly. It seemed that Leola was one of the good ones. "Is that when she started thieving?"

Zack snickered, shaking his head no. 'This place was being shut down because funding was no longer provided. This place didn't have...the same attraction or pull as it had when this place first opened. It was costing this company a lot of money in order to keep it functioning and well, they decided to cut loose so that they would have a major loss. Anyway some people stopped by the house to see about buying it but decided to put their money somewhere else. Leola was getting worried about what she could do to help save this house; since it served as a home away from home kind of deal. And I wanted to save it too, so I followed this person home and he went on his yacht. It was nice and they were celebrating the funding of this other charity. I snuck in, thinking to steal some money when I got trapped below. People went into the office and I panicked and hid in the closet."

At this point Parker burst out laughing. She would have never got trapped. Zack was smiling too.

He continued. "Anyhow, I freaked out and the first person I thought of calling was Leola. She. Was. Furious! She was SO angry with me but she came anyways, dressed for the party and managed to get me out of there without any problems. Later I found out, she had stolen the money I was after and paid for the house. The Man phoned the police but they never found any suspects."

Parker went bugged eyed. "She stole money from the very people who thought of buying it?" She whistled. "That's a daring move." Thinking that's probably what she would have done. Zack nodded, his blue eyes twinkling. Parker looked at him and frowned. "How old are you?"

"Just turned twenty. I stay here because well, its home and I help out."

"Why didn't you go for adoption or something?" Parker asked.

He shrugged, not really knowing the answer himself. "I was too much trouble." He became quiet. "Leola tried to adopt me though."

Parker did a double take and saw he was serious. "I know I was fourteen by that time but still. They wouldn't let her; you know her being a nursing student at the time, not married."

Parker felt guilt wash over her. "I'm sorry." She cleared her throat.

He suddenly smiled. "No worries. So she's still thieving eh?"

Parker nodded, trying to smile but she couldn't. She couldn't believe how harsh she was, judging Leola for something that wasn't even her fault; even if she was part of the same system. Zack and Parker talked and competed again, this time for the fastest time for five locks. She whooped as she won again and he grumbled all the way down the stairs.

The aroma of food was strong in the air and they went to walk in the kitchen where Leola was humming away, the food almost done. Leola checked the chicken broth she had made for Philip and eyed the two of them. She glanced at Parker's eyes and nodded. She walked over, giving her a big hug.

"It's all good Hun." Leola felt Parker nod. Leola asked Zack to check the laundry and he made a face but complied. All was good until yelling could be heard again. Leola instantly ran into the living room where two boys were fighting. She ran into the middle, trying to pull the apart. "Hey calm down! Enough now!" she caught a punch to the stomach and fell backwards. The other boys cheered them on.

Parker stepped forward but Zack stopped her. "Watch this." She gave him a puzzled looked but did as he instructed.

Leola stood up, her eyes flashing and she blew her hair out of her face. "Okay! That enough!" she dove in again, trying to pry the boys apart again. A foot kicked her shin and she hopped backwards.

"OH FALAFLE TRUNKETS AND CHOCLATE COVERED BUTTERBALLS!' she gripped her shin in pain. "OKAY!"She grabbed each boy around their midsection and pulled, causing them to be pinned against her, their back against her sides. They kicked still yelling.

"THAT'S ENOUGH!" she screeched and Zack looked away, hiding a laugh. Parker watched fascinated. Suddenly it was super quiet. Leola took a deep breath.

"You boys go back to your game. Any more fighting, you will join these two AND help me with the dishes." She threatened and they nodded.

She put the two boys she held down. Putting a hand on their shoulders, "march to the kitchen." She ordered. They listened, shuffling to the kitchen. She told them to sit at the table across from each other. "Okay." She breathed, calming herself down. "That hurt." She rubbed her shin and looked at them. "What's your name?" she asked coolly.

The first boy looked at her a scowled. "Dwight." He crossed his arms, his spiky black hair smashed due to the fight.

Looking at the other boy, she waited for a response. "Mike." He finally said.

"Okay then. Well you boys aren't leaving this table until you work it out. Understood?" they just looked at her ridiculously.

She sighed and looked at Zack. "Are they new here?" Zack nodded smiling. She scowled at him.

"Don't start. It worked on you." He stopped immediately and Parker snorted at his reaction. She repeated her question to the boys and they nodded in understanding, still glaring at each other.

Leola gave Zack the stink eye before heading to do some laundry. Parker walked over to the stove and sniffed the food simmering. "This smells really good." Zack nodded. The two boys began to argue. Parker caught the gist but didn't bother to listen. It was something over a video game score.

"Are they really not going to leave the table before working it out?" she asked Zack who nodded.

"Don't know why but it works on the best of us. Besides who wants to do the dishes." He made a face and Parker laughed.

A couple minutes later Leola walked back in and looked out the window at the four boys playing soccer outside. Checking the hamburgers, she noted they were done. She asked Zack and Parker to reel them in and she told Dwight and Mike to work it out and she poured some broth in a bowl and went up stairs to check on Phillip. She checked his temperature which lowered to 100 degrees. He smiled, mumbling sleepily and she decided to let him sleep. He didn't puke again and seemed to be getting better. Leaving the soup beside him, she walked back down and served the boys. Afterwards Parker and Zack had some and she went to cleaning. Then she gave mike and Dwight who still sat at the table some frozen peas for their black eyes.

They bickered some more but Leola ignored it. "You're just going to let them argue?" Parker asked, watching the heated argument grow a hair louder.

"Yep. Better to fight with words and get it out now than with fists later out of my sight." Leola looked around and frowned. "Where's the new lady working here? I haven't seen her since I came."

Zack scratched his head. "Uh about that, I think she quit." Parker snickered and Leola rolled her eyes.

After lunch, Parker chattered like there was no tomorrow. Leola didn't mind as she was glad that Parker was talking to her. However when Parker mentioned jumping off a building again, Leola gave her a look of terror. "Oh come on, I told you first instead of throwing you off." Parker insisted.

Leola shook her head invigourously. "No no no. nooo thank you." Parker bit her lip in disappointment and Leola sighed. "Fine. Once more. Later. Like three months or so."

Parker lit back up and bounced up and down. "It will be more fun." She squealed excitedly and Mike and Dwight looked at her.

"You're weird" they both said raising their eyebrows at her.

Parker nodded in agreement. "I know that."

The boys looked at each other and shrugged. "You good?" they asked each other and then they got up to go back to the living room.

"That's all it took" Parker asked incredulously.

Leola grinned and nodded. "Don't know why but hey, if it works, I will use it."

Zack joined the boys in the living room and Leola finished off a few chores. Around 2, she checked on Phil and the lady for the next shift came. Parker waved goodbye and Leola gave Zack a big hug. He high fived Parker and replied. "Come back soon. I'm sure I will beat your record soon." Parker snickered and agreed.

They drove back and Parker continued to talk Leola's ear off. By the time they reached Nate's place, Leola was chattering away too.

"Thanks for taking me. I had fun." Parker suddenly grinned. "I know about the yacht hehe." She took off like a rabbit up the stairs. Leola shook her head and locked her Mercedes. She went to the stairs and saw Eliot heading down them.

"Hey" he said giving her a big hug and she sighed happily.

"Hello back." she reached up and kissed him.

He bit her lip gently and she smiled. "Want to go somewhere else?" he asked softly, pulling her closer. She nodded and he took her hand, eyeing her Mercedes. The expression on his face looked strained. "Perhaps I should drive. You know, to be on the safe side."

Leola rolled her eyes but handed over the keys to her beloved Mercedes. "Okay bit you better over at least twenty over the speed limit."

Eliot smiled, knowing fully well he wouldn't do that. "Okay." He got in, and started the car, the engine purring as it came to life.

He drove her to a restaurant where she spoke of her day at the kind hearted boys' home, and that Parker became friends with her again. He asked questions about her first break in into the yacht to steal Zack and the money and she told him some of the things Zack did to drive her insane.

He laughed heartily, even when Leola just glared grumpily at him. "It's not funny." She insisted. "One of the reasons my purses have been zip locked was because of him." she thought for a moment. "And jumping to water to escape."

Eliot laughed again thinking back to the heist where they bumped into each other.

* * *

Parker bounded up the stairs and rushed into Nate's apartment and skipped to hop on the couch beside Hardison.

"Whoa! Where did you come from?" Hardison asked a little startled. She just grinned, stealing some skittles form him.

He protested but she slipped some from him before he had a chance to move the bag away. He grumbled, making Parker laugh.

Soon Parker became fidgety and it started to annoy Hardison as he tried to watch the latest episode of doctor who. The bag crinkled every time her knee jostled and he couldn't hold it in any longer.

"Okay Parker? Hey." He said, snapping his fingers to get her attention. "Go see Sophie. She's in her office right now."

She made a face and stuck her tongue out at him before hopping up and bouncing over to Sophie's office.

She opened the door to see parker chatting on the phone.

"Uh let me call you back." she spoke, hanging up the phone quickly seeing Parker's excited smile.

"You were right!" Parker sat in one of the chairs.

"Oh really? About what?"

"I went to the boys' home where she worked and she isn't like the people I was used to seeing in the system." Parker frowned. "I was wrong."

Sophie smiled, happy that things were okay once more. "That's good. Did you have fun?"

"Yep. Had a competition, Leola broke up a fight, she sat them down at the table and I know about her first robbery and how she did it and why and I met Zack who is really nice and I don't know why I thought she was different than me because you were right, she is like us even if she came from a different direction."

She gasped, taking a deep breath.

"Jeez parker breath" Sophie laughed.

"Do you want to go shopping with me?" Sophie asked, planning on go shopping sometime today.

Parker made a face. "No thanks. I'm going to hang out somewhere else. There's a museum opening soon." Sophie sighed and smiled.

"Okay then."

* * *

They arrived at Leola's apartment and Eliot rushed out of the car and round it; opening Leola's door. She smiled and got out looking up at him she whispered thank you.

They began to make their way up the stairs, unable to rear away their eyes from each other. As they reached her door, Leola pulled her keys out; fiddling with them she looked away. She was usually good at this. Eliot smiled and put a hand on the wall behind her, making her look up at him. He moved towards her, leaning in he pushed his lips into hers, kissing her. Leola brought her hands up to his waist pulling him close to her, her body pressing against his. He pressed forward; Leola's back gently pushing into the wall behind her. Leola's heart pounded so hard, Eliot swore he could feel it against his chest. He smiled into the kiss as her hand slipped away and opened the door to her apartment. The door flew open and they fell in, almost falling over. Eliot wrapped an arm around her and managed to steady them both. She exhaled heavily and laughed. Eliot joined in pausing a moment for him to kick the door close. She laughed and tripped over her feet as she pushed her shoes off. Eliot wrapped an arm around her steadying her again. He looked into her eyes and brought his lips to hers again, placing his hand on the side of her face.

"Thanks" she whispered kissing him again, slowly and inventively.

Eliot pulled out of the kiss; their body's only inches apart. His hand slid down her neck over her shoulder, his finger tips tracing the curves to her body. "Always" he whispered back, brining his other hand to rest on her waist.

She brought her arm up and grabbed his shirt pulling him into her closing the gap that was between them. His hands stayed on her hips as they kissed. She slid hers up his chest; she kissed him harder as she began to pull his jacket off. He shrugged it off as it landed on the floor. Her arms looped around his neck as his hand gripped her hips; lifting her up so she sat on his hips. His hands sliding up her shirt, he kissed her neck. She tipped her head back as they made their way to the bedroom. As they reached the bed he lowered her on to it, except he misjudged the distance and nearly dropped her on the floor. Almost falling off she laughed steadying herself and pulling herself up more.

"Sorry" he whispered.

"Come here" she smiled pulling him over to her. She pulled up his shirt, Eliot lifting his arms up so she could pull it off him. She kissed his chest, trailing small kisses down one of his scars as he ran his hands down her back. Eliot grabbed the ends of her shirt lifting it up pulling it off, carelessly throwing it to the floor. His hands moved to the buttons of her pants as he began kissing down her body, her hands gripping his strong shoulders. He laid her down on her back grabbing the waist of her jeans he pulled them off her. She sat up and kissed his hip as she undid his belt, his pants falling to the floor once undone. He kissed her hard as he lowered himself on top her and covered them up.

**Please review!**

**The next chapter will be up soon. **


	9. Chapter 9: Love in the air

**Author's note: I'm sorry this is late. I am drowning in homework and assignments but I will do my best to get the chapters up on time. Also, my trusty editor lost her internet so if something doesn't make sense, I will fix it as soon as possible. **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but Leola. **

**Enjoy and don't forget to review! **

**Chapter 9**

He woke up in the dark and blinked, trying to figure out where he was. He turned around and took a look at the silhouette form sleeping beside him and smiled. He looked around the room for a clock and glanced at not one, but two alarm clocks in her room. He wondered about it, as one was beside her and the other across the room.

He left it alone and saw it was 5:58 in the morning and sighed. He smiled at Leola who had the covers bunched right over her. He slipped an arm around her midsection and she curled into him, without waking up. He kissed her temple and she sighed sleepily.

"Morning darling." He whispered, smiling as she just laid there in his arms. "You awake?"

"Uh uh." She mumbled; a small smile on her lips. He chuckled and kissed her temple and then her shoulder as she went to turn around.

Suddenly the alarm clock blared and her hand shot out from underneath the blanket, grabbed the alarm clock and threw it across the room. The blaring stopped instantly and she turned, snuggling in with her head on his chest.

"Oh. I see why you have two clocks now." He looked down at her, stroking her shoulder softly. "You go through many alarm clocks?"

"No. trick was to find sturdy ones." She mumbled sleepily, finally waking up.

He laughed. "I bet."He yawned and nudged her and she grumbled. "Come on. I'm gonna get breakfast started."

"I will be there in a minute." She flipped over, throwing the pillow over her head, making Eliot chuckle.

She heard Eliot throw on his jeans and walk out. She instantly smiled.

Throwing the pillow away, she got up stretching and headed to the bathroom. Last night was ahhmazing.

She grabbed his shirt, flipping it on before heading to the kitchen where he had bacon sizzling in the pan. She walked up behind him, wrapping her arms around his stomach, giving him a big hug.

"Ha-ha, somebody is feeling good this morning." He teased and she giggled, peeking at the bacon from behind his back.

"Mm that smells really good." She sniffed the air appreciately. Then she ran her hands through his ponytail. "That's a sexy pony you're rocking there Eliot." She teased, flipping his hair.

He laughed turned around, so she leaned against his chest. "Well nice bed head you have as well darling." He joked, eyeing the messy hair she had.

"Oh you know you love it."

"Know what else I like?" he leaned down, kissing the corner of her eye, his hands running down the length of her body. He kissed her nose and then the corner of her mouth. She shivered as his hands went up her back.

She cupped his face, pressing her lips eagerly to his and smiled as he chuckled. He pulled her closer and she wrapped herself around him as he lifted her up.

"Wait."

She pulled back looking at him. "What about the food?"

He laughed and leaned over shutting it off. "We can deal with that later."

She grinned and kissed him, her hand tracing down his back and then his chest. She pulled back and frowned. "You have many scars." She commented as Eliot sat them both on the couch; Leola sitting on top of him.

He looked down where she traced a jagged scar going across his shoulder. "Yeah been through many fights." He mumbled, his eyes searching Leola's. She just traced her fingers lightly over them, and landed on a bullet hole. "And this one?"

"A sniper. That one was another sniper but a different time." She raised an eyebrow. "I see."

"And you?" he teased. Her smile fell a bit as she thought and grinned. Taking off her shirt, she put his hand on her ribs.

"Right there. Feel it?" Eliot ran his fingers over her ribs, not really finding anything unusual. She pressed his fingers a little harder. There was a dent and he could feel it clearly now. "That was from an accident. Jumped off the balcony in Belgium and hit the side of the boat. It didn't break but it didn't heal properly either."

Eliot raised an eyebrow, his hands gently running across her chest. "And do you tend to jump out of windows into water often?'

"No...Well...yes...well no." Eliot grinned sarcastically making her roll her eyes. "What's it matter to you?" she winked, kissing him slyly, playing.

Her heart quickened as he kissed her ear, then her throat and her chest, slowly trailing kisses. She sighed happily as his hands explored. She wrapped his face in her hands, kissing him hard and grinned as he rolled her over, her leg wrapping around his hip.

* * *

Hardison yawned as he finished the last touches to the phone he was making at Leola's request. She had asked for a VERY complicated phone. He grumbled grumpily, shoving a mouthful of gummies in his mouth, washing them down with a huge gulp of his orange pop. The pop fizzed as he swallowed and he gave a satisfied burp. Mumbling unintelligently, he fused two more wires together and then downloaded the software he had made. He glanced over at his computer longingly, thinking of the levels of Warcraft he could have broken in the past five hours he worked on the phone. But the phone piked his interest so he guessed it was win-win. The computer beeped and Hardison smiled. "Oh yea I am REEAALLL good." He glanced at the clock excitedly and decided to head over to Leola's to give it to her.

* * *

Leola gave a quiet laugh as Eliot kissed her shoulder once more. He pulled her closer to him, wrapping the blanket over them. "That was something." She commented, seeing the trail of disaster leading out of the bedroom.

Eliot followed her gaze, chucking proudly. "Ah that was nothing darling." She turned over, her eyebrow raising. "Really? I'd love to see your best."

Eliot smile grew wider as he brushed her hair behind her ear. "But right now." She leaned close to his ear. "I'm hungry and I'm gonna grab a shower."

She jumped off, the blanket falling to the floor, revealing her as she turned around, walking out. Eliot laughed and marvelled how sexy she looked; her hips swaying as she moved.

"Was that you asking me to cook something?" he called out.

"No, that was me telling you." Her laugh floated out of the bathroom as the water turned on. Eliot grinned and looked at the time. It was now 9:30 in the morning. He got up, throwing on his jeans once more and headed to the kitchen. His stomach was growling.

Ten minutes later, she came out, showered and dressed, sniffing the air as she walked over and wrapped her hands around Eliot again.

Eliot laughed, his hands covering hers, the bacon sizzling in the pan. "Déjà vu don't you think?" he asked, flipping the pancakes with one hand. She sighed happily, scooting him over to take control of the cooking. Eliot went grabbed his shower himself, a big smile spread across his face.

He came back out about seven minutes later and Leola had the table set and the food on the table. He grinned, his curly hair just flipped back out of his face with a bandana. Leola just sat down to eat when someone knocked eagerly on her door. Frowning as she got up, she opened the door to reveal Hardison in the act of peeking through her keyhole. "Oh hell, sorry didn't think you'd be home." He spoke sheepishly.

She just raised an eyebrow, smiling. Eliot looked out from the table and groaned. "Dammit Hardison." He muttered, setting his fork down as she invited Hardison in.

"Hey, I completed the thing you wanted." Hardison said, sitting himself down at the table, rubbing his hands together. MAN he was HUNGRY. "Food looks good." He took a gigantic bite, eating a pancake and bacon at the same time. "MMM, tastes good too." He grabbed some more food and Leola smirked, grabbing another plate and sitting down herself. Eliot just glared at Hardison but he didn't notice. Eliot turned his gaze onto Leola, who just looked right out amused. She gave a half shrug and smiled brightly, her cheeks pink, causing Eliot's irritation to dimmish. He smiled slowly, his eyes still on Leola as he reached for pancakes and bacon himself.

After they ate, they sat and drank some coffee and Hardison thanked Leola for breakfast. He began chattering about some computer thing and Eliot could make absolutely no sense of it. Thankfully, Leola interrupted him.

"Hardison, I assume you didn't know we were having breakfast at this hour." She said pointedly but kind. Hardison nodded, clapping his hands together, a smug grin on his face. "I finished your phone."

"Oh that's great!" Leola laughed impressed and Eliot watched, not knowing what they were talking about. "That was fast though. You are a genius." She insisted and Hardison nodded happy.

"I know I know. Age of THE geek." Hardison Gave Eliot an arrogant smile.

Eliot gave him a dirty look back, sitting there quietly fuming as Hardison passed over a phone which Leola took eagerly. Her fingers quickly clacked the keypad and a moment later, she nodded satisfied. "Yes this is exactly what I was looking for. "

"Good." Hardison looked back over at Eliot and then frowned. Looking back and forth between Eliot and Leola, his frown got deeper. "Hey uh, Eliot, what are you doing here so early too?"

Now it was Eliot's turn to lean back and give a smug smile. Hardison looked over at Leola suspiciously and his eyes widen.

"Whoa wait, you guys are..." the glances between Eliot and Leola told Hardison. "Oh man, dude, you? That's just nice." He closed his eyes. "I have to javex my brain." He looked over at Leola who was trying her best not to laugh. Eliot didn't care; he chuckled loudly, knowing it bugged Hardison.

"You have javex around here somewhere, cuz seriously; I need a gallon of it." Hardison was smiling at this point.

Leola went to answer when another knock was heard at the door. She got up, opening it to find her neighbour. "Oh hey Ned."

Eliot's grin left his face immediately and he stood up, standing in the hallway, his expression hardening. Hardison noticed the sudden change in him.

"Whoa." He muttered quietly, leaning his chair back to peek at the guy Eliot didn't seem to like so much.

"Hey, uh Leola right?" Ned asked, holding a map.

"Yeah that right." She smiled, looking down at the map he held. "You need help? Come on in." she ushered him in and Eliot downright stared Ned down. Ned gave a nervous chuckle.

"Hey there, you're Eliot right? We met last time."

The dislike was heard clearly in Eliot's tone. "Yeah I know."

Hardison snickered. "Hey man, I'm Hardison. Another friend of Leola's." He got up and shook Ned's hand.

"Ah I'm Ned, nice to meet you. I'm her neighbour."

Leola rolled her eyes at Eliot and gave him a dirty look, but he paid no attention. His eyes were watching Ned's every move.

"Ok then, well I was just wondering if you could help me get here." He pointed to a section on the map. She looked at it, and nodded. "Yeah that's just off this route right here." She pointed to the route she was talking about.

"And you couldn't use a computer?" Eliot asked, still giving his death glare.

Ned hesitated. "I don't have my laptop yet."

"And the library? Or your phone?" Eliot asked again and Hardison was amused by the tension between Ned and Eliot.

"Eliot, come on, leave him alone." Leola smacked Eliot's arm, breaking his gaze on Ned for a split second.

"Right you know what, I get the sense I'm not welcome here." Ned said, trying to lightening the tension.

Leola laughed. "No you are it—"

"No he's right Leola." Eliot interrupted, crossing his arms. Leola gave him a glare of her own. Taking a deep breath, she gave Ned an apologetic smile.

"He's just a grumpy man, you know them, and they never like anything." She took Ned's arm and walked him to the door. Leaning in, she whispered loudly to ensure Eliot could hear. "You know, most of the time, it's because they are constipated."

Hardison broke out laughing and Leola managed to get a chuckle out of Ned. "Well thank you then. See you later." She nodded and closed the door, whipping her gaze back to Eliot, who looked completely shocked.

"I'm not grumpy and I'm not grumpy because I'm constipated." He argued, as Hardison's hooting laughter was still going on.

"Yeah well that wasn't nice and he's MY neighbour, not yours, and what is it with you and this guy?" she huffed, sitting down to drink her coffee. Eliot sat down too, frowning as he thought of a reason. He really had no reason.

"I don't know. I don't like him but I don't remember him from anywhere. His accent or face doesn't seem familiar." He shook his head. "But still I don't like him."

"Yeah well you couldn't cut that tension with one of Eliot's knife." Hardison guffawed, making a slicing motion with his hand. Eliot's gaze wiped the smile off Hardison's face and he cleared his throat, pretending to cough. "Constipated."

Eliot slammed his coffee down. "Dammit Hardison!"

Leola snickered, thinking it was funny as she watch the two of them bicker. After they managed to settle, Eliot spoke calmly again.

"I still want you to run a background check on him" Eliot said, drinking the rest of his coffee.

"What? Eliot no, there's nothing wrong with him and besides if there is, you will be the first to know." Leola insisted.

Ignoring Leola, Hardison agreed. "Alright, besides it will be interesting to see what about him irks you so much."

"Hardison! You're not supposed to be agreeing with him!" she groaned frustrated.

"Oh come Leola, if there is nothing weird, then I will leave it alone and it won't hurt." Eliot argued.

"Oh and it's always fun to run background checks." Hardison added in, receiving an annoyed glare from Leola.

"I know you ran mine remember?" she spoke annoyed. Hardison went silent, not wanting to make her mad. He decided it was time to leave.

"Well, I gotta go and uh, see you Eliot at Nate's, oh and Leola, if I don't see you before you go, see you after." With that, Hardison made his escape quickly.

"Wait you're going where?" Eliot asked confused.

"Um I have a job for me in Germany...then Russia." She watched his expression. "I should be back in at least a week. Besides Nate told me that you guys might be taking another job."

"Wait, Hardison and Nate knew?" he asked, not happy he didn't know about it first.

'Well yeah, but I was going to tell you today. But uh, things came up." She grinned and Eliot knew what "things" she was speaking about.

He sighed and nodded. "Sounds fine. That's why you need that phone Hardison made for you?" he asked pointing at the phone on the table.

"Yeah, it's just a little something to make my life easier." She got up smiling, walking over to his side and planting a big kiss on his lips. "Just like you make my life happier."

He smiled. "I know how to make your life exciting too." He replied, biting her lip playfully. She laughed and shied away from him, collecting the dirty dishes.

"I know you can Hun. I experienced that last night." She grinned. "Come on, help me. I have to get packed soon and I would like to test out this phone." Eliot obliged, walking over and putting the dirty dishes in the sink.

* * *

Leola went and goodbye to the team and she drove to the airport with Eliot. Eliot hung on for dear life and was sure they would get stopped by the cops. He looked over once at the speedometer and he nearly had a heart attack. Finally she parked outside the airport and Eliot took what he thought was the first breath since he got into her Mercedes. He helped her get out her one suitcase and shut the trunk. He looked over, taking in the pinkish glow to her cheeks, the smile in her eyes and the way she was biting at her lip.

"Gonna miss me?" she asked, a smile paying on her lips. He gave her a smile back, pulling her into a tight hug.

He turned into her hair, loving the way it smelled like vanilla. She always did, whether she was in disguise or not. "I dunno darling, depends how long you're gone." He mumbled into her hair and she let out a shocked gasp, slapping him on his back. He let out a chuckle and she relished how his chest rumbled. She squeezed him once more and pulled back, and gave him a sweet kiss.

"bye." She waved a little awkwardly and started towards the entrance. He put his hands in his pockets and watched her until she disappeared into the crowd. He let out a deep sigh and knew he would miss her. Getting into the car, he got a call from Nate.

"_Hey come in, we have a new job. Jack Hurley."_

"On my way." Eliot answered, looking back in the review mirror, a smile on his lips. A job to keep him busy, the past is buried and a girl he loved. Life was good.

**Hope you enjoyed it and please review! I would love to hear from you. :)**


	10. Chapter 10: Separate jobs

**Author's note: This has a episode tag on it, including some dialogue and such from the episode...I guess you get the idea :P **

**Episode tag: The twelve step job.**

**Disclaimer: I own nothing except Leola. **

**I hope you enjoy it and don't forget to review! ;)**

**Also Lalabada123, I won't forget (only because you so kindly remind me at least once a week :P) And thanks! I'm so glad you love my story. If i didnt have you telling me to put it up, this story proably wouldnt have existed. :)**

**Chapter 10: Separate jobs**

Leola adjusted her black wig; brushing the long straight strands off her shoulder. She grinned excitedly as she walked up to the building, and tested out the phone. The alarm systems were instantly bypassed and she had one minute to get in. she quickly picked the lock to the back door and slipped in, turning the alarm system back before the security noticed. She stepped over quietly to a corner and peeked down the hall. Nobody in sight, she clicked another button on the phone, bringing up the video feeds. She thanked Hardison in her mind, loving how he laid out the systems and programs she needed to pull this off. Perhaps she wouldn't throw this one away. Video feeds looped, she skipped down the hallway.

* * *

Back at Nate's office, they had checked Jack Hurley into rehab and Nate went over the game plan.

"Alright, Parker and me will go in as patients and Sophie, you can go in as the doctor." Nate explained taking another gulp of his drink, not even bothering to wince as the alcohol burned his throat.

Sophie looked at him sideways and formulated a plan to get Nate to see how bad his drinking really was getting. She really wanted to help him but there was no way she could, as long as Nate kept pushing everything away. Then, as soon as Nate told her she would be the doctor, she made a plan of her own. Nate would be entering rehab but not for pretend.

"Good then what are we waiting for?" Parker asked, looking at everyone, crossing her legs.

Nate looked to Sophie who nodded. "That sounds good. So the plan is to trick him into thinking that he entered himself into rehab and our goal is to get the location of the money from him."

"Yep that is basically it." Nate replied, finishing the last of his drink. He could go a few days without it; he was sure.

"Alright while you guys do that, then Eliot and I will go find Jack's car and see if he hid the money there." Hardison added, looking over at Eliot who just glared at him.

"Uh no, first thing first." Eliot growled, walking to the kitchen and back, whipping the paper towel at Hardison. Hardison managed to catch the paper towel before it nearly gave him a concussion.

"You're cleaning your slushee out of my truck."

"No, see its your tone, I don't like how you speak dude, I mean come on, it was just a little spill..." Hardison shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.

As Nate walked to the door, Parker muttered, "OOHHH you're in trouble." She snickered and walked out.

Hardison looked over at Sophie. "Also Sophie you needed this thing remember?" he stood up, walking towards Sophie. Eliot simply stood there, his arms crossed.

Sophie shook her head at Hardison, giving him a sympathetic smile. "Sorry Hardison, you're on your own. You spilled in HIS truck, you clean it up.' She patted him on the shoulder. "Besides, you really want to fight Eliot over a slushee? You won't come out unscathed." She called out, walking out to join Nate and Parker.

"What? No wai—"Hardison turned around to see Eliot glaring at him smugly. "See, that's just disrespectful. Ask nicely. I mean seriously, it's a slushee. Damn." Hardison muttered, walking downstairs to the truck. Eliot smiled satisfied and followed behind him. He glanced at the time and picked up his phone. He just had to call Leola. He couldn't help but think about what she was up to.

* * *

Oh fudge." Leola muttered as she strained to squeeze in the narrow space. She had measured a little off and now she was stuck in the vent. Why on earth couldn't have she went down from the ceiling? That would have been so much easier, but no, now she was stuck in place and she was sure that she only had ten minutes to pull this stunt. She strained, pushing her foot first and wiggled a few more feet. Why they put such a narrow space in this specific vent, she didn't know. It should have been easier than going up three floors and going through the wider vent. She didn't mind that part; it was having to dangle from the ceiling. Being reminded why she was stuck in the first place; she wiggled again, and managed to pull herself a few feet more. She pulled herself another few inches.

"weichen Sie Kaninchen und snuffleogous aus" she whispered angrily in German. Suddenly her phone rang. She sighed exasperatedly and looked longingly at the room she had to enter to get to the vault holding the Zadonshchina. She couldn't turn her head to see who was calling but she answered anyways.

"Hello" she answered in a German accent.

"_Leola?"_ Eliot asked, unsure.

She instantly smiled. "Hey!" she whispered, remembering not to breathe too much. She pulled herself another few inches. Almost there. "How are you?"

_I'm good; we ended up taking a job. Nate and Parker are in rehab." _She frowned, wondering why but then thought it would be because of the job. _"what about you?"_ Eliot asked, happy that he had called in the first place.

"uh..." she eyed the space she had left to wiggle through. "I'm in a...tight spot but I getting out of it."

"_oh did the guards catch you?"_ Eliot asked worried.

She rolled her eyes. "Im just stuck, literally...like wedged." There was a pause on the other end and then Eliot burst out laughing.

"Hey! It's not funny! I was going to break a record here! Not anymore." She grumbled, wiggling forward again.

"_Ok ok, how the heck did you manage that? You know what, tell me when you get back here. HEY! You're not done! I can still see the blue stain from here!" _

"what's going on?" she wondered and heard Hardison muttering something she couldn't pick up.

"_Oh it will be your head I punch."_ Eliot threatened and she assumed it was to Hardison.

"Let me guess, he spilled something?"

"_Yeah, his damn slushee in my truck. He's cleaning it now."_

"_You are a bully Eliot. You have issues. Seriously there is nothing left, I can't even see it. you're paranoid.'_ Hardison's voice came on clear.

"_Hey get away from the phone. OOF! DAMNIT HARDSION! "_ Eliot screamed, as Hardison knocked his water down his shirt.

"_Hey uh Leola? Mind helping me out here? He's looking VERY constipated at the second." _Hardison snickered, unable to hold it in.

Leola laughed quietly too, hoping the guards couldn't hear. She heard Eliot growl clearly, even though she was on the phone. _"Seriously Leola? You're with him? he's very scary looking at the second. you might be attending my funeral. Will you avenge me? I mean come on Eliot what are your intentions with Leola? Whhoooaaaa, waiiiitttttt. ELIOT! AHH!" _

She burst out laughing as she heard a scuffle and someone groaning. "_Dammit Hardison!"_

"_Hey, that is NOT my fault. I have freedom of speech here."_ Hardison groaned, as he leaned against the truck. Eliot gave him a good whack to his chest. He wheezed and coughed.

"_imma need therapy dude. You gonna pay for it?"_ Hardison asked. He said something else but Leola couldn't make it out.

"_AVENGE ME!"_Hardison cackled as he ran away. She definitely heard that.

She tried to quiet her laughter as she was shaking the vent.

She pulled herself the last few inches and pulled free. She inhaled deeply and jumped down from the vent. She gave it a dirty look before scouting the room.

"_Sorry about that."_ Eliot apologized, his anger ebbing away. That was definitely not how he imagined the phone call would go.

"oh that's fine Hun. I'm free now." She whispered, hacking into the security system and hacking the password of the vault. It hissed as the bolts clanked and opened.

She sprayed the air to reveal the laser beams. Taking off her bag, she went back a few steps before jumping, sliding in between two beams into the vault. She grunted as her knee banged the floor on the other side.

"_What are you doing?" _

"Oh you know, hanging out, grabbing some things." She joked.

"_Are you...you're breaking into the vault as you're talking to me?"_ Eliot asked incredulously.

"Yupp. Smart eh? I will always remember this place, thanks to you." She smiled and carefully placed the zadonschina in her bag. "Why you missing me?" she teased, knowing she missed him sorely over the past few days.

Eliot smiled softly. _"maybe."_ He said in a light tone. "_Depends. You missing me?"_

Her smile softened, as she wondered how to answer. "What do you think?"

"_hmm. I think yes." _

She smiled again as she leaped between the beams and shut the vault, scanning for security. "hmmm. I believe you might be right." Causing him to laugh. Suddenly she heard footsteps. "crap. um Eliot, can we talk later? I should be home in a few days anyways and I hope everyone is alright and please don't hurt Hardison, you need him for hacking and such and yes I am missing you and I know you're missing me and I have to go and I hope things go good and see you in a few days bye!"

She quickly hung up and ran to the vent. Remembering it was too small, she didn't want to take the chance of crushing the scroll. She slipped down another hallway and pulled herself up above the doorway, hoping that the guard wouldn't walk in completely.

* * *

With the disconnected tone ringing in his ear Eliot sighed. Sorrow filled him because he missed her but at the same time he had a sense of relief; at least she knew what he meant. He couldn't bring himself to say anything over the phone but he had wanted to hear her voice. He walked back into Nate's to join Hardison and the see where they were in the job.

Hardison and Eliot headed to the parking lot where Jack's vehicle was parked and Hardison got into the seat. Eliot noticed how far up the seat was and knew something was wrong. He frowned looking at Hardison.

'Hurley's a big guy right?" Eliot asked, looking around.

"yeah." Hardison answered, looking at the dashboard. Eliot looked around the parking lot, his thoughts racing.

"So is the parking attendant." Eliot muttered. "Why is the seat so far forward?" he asked, not sure if he wanted to know the answer.

Hardison didn't pay attention, instead focused on what he was in the car to do. "I dont think I can pop the trunk without starting the car."

Eliot's thoughts raced as he put together possibilities. "Somebody's been in the car." He spoke aloud, getting more concerned by the second. Finally Hardison shifted his attention to Eliot.

"What's your problem?" Hardison asked, confused as to why Eliot was so paranoid.

"Hang on, hang on, hang on." Eliot ducked down to check for possible places for a bomb. Sure enough, there was a bomb under the car. He felt his stomach knot and he forced himself to be calm. He couldn't lose any more teammates.

Standing up, he tried to compose himself. "Yeah, there's a bomb."

Hardison sat there, looking at Eliot wide eyed. "What?"

"Listen, listen. There's a bomb."

Hardison paid no attention and immediately tried to get out of the seat.

"No no no."

Eliot fought against Hardison's panic and forced him and stay. "Stay! Stay stay."

'Move, move!" Hardison fought and Eliot growled. "Listen to me! Its right underneath the seat." Hardison stopped moving. " alright? That means it has to be pressure sensitive. If you move, this thing's gonna go off."

Hardison looked around the car, his wide eyes, flickering back and forth as he racked his brain, trying to register what Eliot just said. He stayed still as Eliot checked the bomb again.

"Pressure sensitive?" Hardison asked. "Its pressure sensitive, you sure?" Eliot didn't answer and Hardison took it as a yes.

"Ok, pressure, pressure. Ok um, Eliot, go-go and get a bag of bricks." Hardison was sure this would work.

Eliot listened to his plan and rolled his eyes. "That only works in movies."

"BAG OF BRICKS IS A GOOD SOUND PLAN!" Hardison yelled, looking down at Eliot. Suddenly there was a two minute timer on the bomb. Eliot decided it was time to panic. He had no idea how to get Hardison out of this one. He listed off that the bomb had wires and that's how it would be picking up the signal. Luckily Hardison formulated a plan as he said he would reboot the system.

'You want me to kick it?" Eliot asked.

Hardison stared at him. "Oh god I'm gonna die." He ordered Eliot to pop the hood.

He listened to Hardison and opened the hood and looked at Hardison incredulously as Hardison said there was a half a second margin of error and he was freaked. "Run that bag of bricks by me again?" he asked, hoping Hardison felt it was a good plan still. Hardison gave him a dirty look, counted down and yelled "now!"

Eliot wrenched out the wires and jumped away from the truck. He breathed a sigh of relieve after the truck didn't blow. He reached under and pulled out the bomb, tossing it to Hardison. "Have a souvenir." He smiled as Hardison went to take off on him, the smile quickly turning to rage. "Where you going. We have to search the car." Hardison began to mumble on about freshening up and going to cry as a black SUV drove up. Eliot had it under control though; he could take whatever they threw his way. It was what he did best. Or at least that was what he thought until the other car showed up to the party.

* * *

The guard began walking in and he looked around the vault room and glanced at his digital watch. She could see the time; he was so close to her. It was 12:30 midnight. She quietly got her phone out and hacked into the computer at the security desk. She whipped up some music and played it on the speaker phone of the building. The guard went to take a step into the room when poker face by lady gaga blared on the P.A system. He jumped and gave a shrill scream, yelling into his radio. "TURN IT OFF! THAT IS NOT FUNNY!" he yelled angrily, thinking his buddies played a prank on ran back out and she waited until she no longer could his shadow. She grinned and hopped down, running for the back door. She was home free.

The next night, she took the red eye flight to Russia, under a new passport and disguise. She smiled as everything went to plan. In four hours she would land and in another five, she could be on her way home again.

* * *

_He stomped on the brake, his heart pounding as he watched the car in front of him. He breathed relieved, glad that it wasn't going to happen. Suddenly the car was surrounded. He jumped out of the car but it was too late._

"_NNOOO!" he yelled, running even as the car flipped and rolled five times and caught on fire. He could hear them screaming in pain. "Hang on! I'm coming!" _

_He punched out a thug and head butted the other thug, racing towards the fire, hearing his name being screamed in pain. _

"_Eliot! OH GOD!" He heard Jonathon scream. _

"_HANG ON!" his heart beat wildly as he ran as fast as he could. _

_The fire sparked the gasoline and the car blew up. The force threw Eliot bac—_

Eliot woke up with a gasp, his sheets turned and he was covered in sweat. His heart was beating a mile a minute, unable to slow it he cursed, wiping the sweat angrily from his face. The nightmares were back.

* * *

Three days later, she left the airport at 10 at night and rented a car. She knew they were doing a case and she wasn't sure if they were finished. Eliot would probably be irritated she didn't call but she would swing by in the morning. She got home late, around 12 and she got changed into pjs, dropping her stuff on the floor. That could wait. She walked over and grabbed some tea. putting her feet up, she sat in silence and closed her eyes, running the last job through her mind.

Back at Eliot's place, Eliot woke up jumping out of his nightmare. He looked at the time and groaned. There was a reason he never slept longer than two hours. The whole scene with Hardison and the bomb had brought up memories he tried to forget. He decided to call Leola, see where she was at, as they haven't talked since their last phone call. Not that the phone call was any good. Dialling, he waited. Then she answered sleepily.

"_Hello?"_ she asked, covering a yawn.

"Uh hey it's Eliot."

"_Oh hey!"_ she sounded more alert now.

"Did I wake you?" he asked concerned. He didn't know what time it would be wherever she was.

"_No not really. Why don't you come over?"_ she asked, smiling.

"You're home? Why didn't you call?"

"_I thought you guys might be doing a job still. I was going to meet up with you in the morning." _she glanced at the clock. _"Well technically its morning so." _

Eliot rolled his eyes. "I'll be over in ten." he hung up and threw on a pair of jeans with a loose t shirt. He grabbed his keys and headed over.

In exactly ten minutes she opened the door and he stood there. She smiled as he enveloped her into a hug.

"Hello darling." He whispered, tightening his arms. She turned her head into his shoulder and smiled giving a big sigh.

"Hello back. It's good to be back."

He came in and sat down on the couch.

She grabbed a blanket and snuggled beside him. He told her about the job they had taken, and how Hardison wanted to use a bag of bricks to diffuse the bomb. She laughed as he told her of Parker on the happy meds.

"Aw I wish I was here to see that." She chuckled, imagining Parker hyped up on meds.

They settled into a comfortable silence but Eliot tried to stifle a yawn. She leaned back, taking a good look at him. She frowned, seeing the darkening bags under his eyes. Running a hand through his hair softly she spoke.

"Haven't been sleeping?" she stated and Eliot just shrugged his shoulders. She didn't need to know; didn't need to carry the guilt.

She smiled softly, planting a kiss on Eliot's lips. "Come on." She laced her hands in his, pulling him to the bedroom.

She climbed into her bed and motioned for Eliot to do the same. He smiled, pulling off his shirt and climbing in beside her as she snuggled in close. He wrapped his arm around her midsection, happy to have her close to him.

She put her hand on top of his and squeezed gently. "Goodnight."

He kissed her shoulder and whispered, "Night darling."

He laid there as her breathing evened out and he shuffled around a bit, feeling sleepy himself. Just as he drifted off to sleep, he swore he had heard, "sweet dreams." being mumbled from Leola's lips. He opened his eyes but she was sleeping. He smiled anyways and moved in closer, his eyelids heavy and fell into a heavenly dreamless sleep.

**Hope you liked it and if so, please review! **


	11. Chapter 11: Mr Turkey

**Author's note: I am soooooo sorry. This chapter is long and I couldn't stop writing! I think I should be able to update as usual now. Again, thanks for being patient with me. **

**Disclaimer: I own nothing but Leola. **

**Please review! **

**Chapter 11: Mr. Turkey**

Leola headed upstairs and walked into Nate's. The first person she saw was Sophie. She walked over and smiled. "Hey Sophie!" Leola wrapped her in a hug. "How are you?"

Sophie shrugged and gave a small smile. "Oh you know." Leola's smile faltered as she looked past Sophie to see Nate with a drink in his hand. She gave Sophie a sympathetic smile.

"He will come around." Sophie smiled. "How are you? Get want you were there to do?"

Leola grinned and nodded. "I was in a tight spot for a moment but I got it done. The phone that Hardison made for me helped a lot." She looked around to see if Hardison was around. "Speaking of which, is Hardison still alive? Eliot and Hardison were arguing and well, he said to avenge him if he wasn't alive."

Sophie laughed, giving her a weird look. "Yeah he's just watching TV." Sophie scratched her head as Leola gave her a smile and headed over to the living room.

Sophie sighed, looking at Nate, wondering if he would ever get better. She headed over to the kitchen to grab a glass of water.

Leola walked into the living room and was nearly knocked off her feet. "OHH!" she grabbed on to the couch for support as she tried to figure out what exactly hit her.

"YOU"RE BACK!" Parker practically screamed into her ear. Leola laughed and gave Parker a hug too.

"Yes I am." She smiled happily as Parker gave her one of the cookies from the container. "Aw thanks Parker, that's nice of you."

"Hey that's not fair, come on Parker. I mean, you give her one but not me?" Hardison's voice piped into the conversation.

Parker gave him a glare. "Yes but she didn't take a picture of me now did she?"

"Oh come on! That was picture quality." Hardison protested as Parker stuck her tongue out and walked out. Leola watched this exchange and raised an eyebrow as Hardison. Hardison just shrugged. "What's up?"

Leola nodded back. "Nothing much."

"Hey where's Eliot? I thought he'd be with you." Hardison commented, looking over his shoulder.

Leola gave him a weird look. "What did you do, pick on everyone while I was gone? What'd I miss?"

Hardison snickered. "Parker was on happy pills and well...I just had to take a picture." He pulled out a picture and showed it to her, keeping a lookout for Parker.

Leola looked at the picture and smiled. Parker had the biggest smile on her face and she had her arms around Hardison and Eliot. Nate and Sophie were in the background smiling. She couldn't help but laugh as Eliot's incredulous expression at the happy Parker. What really caught her attention was Hardison big smile. It was just as big as Parker's.

"Were you on happy pills too?" Leola asked, noticing this.

Hardison frowned and leaned in closer to the photograph. "Uh...no. why?"

"No reason." Leola quickly jumped up and handing Hardison, back the photo. "I see why she would be mad though. She does look extremely happy in that photo. Oh and Eliot should be here in five minutes anyways. He was just dropping something off."

"Ah, I see..." Hardison said, turning around to watch some TV.

Leola walked into the kitchen and parker was up in the counter munching on some cookies and Sophie was sitting down with her drink of water. "What no job yet?" Leola asked as she sat down, grabbing a Pepsi.

"No not yet. We might have another one either today or tomorrow. At least that's what Nate says." Sophie replied.

Leola frowned and was going to say something as Eliot walked in. She instantly smiled and gave him a hug. "Hello, what'd I miss?" He said giving her a tight squeeze back.

"Uh nothing much. I haven't really seen Nate, Hardison is watching TV and we are in here." Leola gestured to Sophie and Parker. "However I must say Hardison seems to have gotten into many pickles while I was gone." She commented, looking suspiciously at Eliot.

"I have no clue what you're talk'n about." He sounded confused. Parker snorted and rolled her eyes.

"She means Hardison has gotten himself into trouble. Mmm, these cookies are REALLY good." Parker shoved another in her mouth and smiled.

Eliot shook his head and sat himself down as Hardison headed into the kitchen.

"So what did you do to make everyone mad this time Hardison" Leola teased.

"He nearly got himself blown up for one." Eliot growled. "And he wanted to use a bag of bricks to get himself out of it."

Leola giggled, picturing this in her head.

"HEY! Like I said before, bag of bricks is a good sound plan." Hardison protested as Eliot rolled his eyes. "And you agreed with me after so don't start dude."

"Very nice. Glad to see I don't have to avenge you." Leola laughed as Hardison nodded.

"I got him back though, revenge is always sweet."

Leola nodded sarcastically. "Right." Looking over at Sophie, she asked, "So what happened on this job." Sophie explained and Leola had to laugh when she got up to the point where Parker was on happy pills.

"I'm sorry Parker but that's just too funny." She laughed again. "And I saw that photo. It's cute. I especially love everyone's expressions." She nudged Eliot. "Including yours." Eliot smiled, his head propped on his hand.

"Yeah well Eliot and Hardison were at stripper bars." Parker shot back, looking at Hardison. Hardison's and Eliot's eyes widened. Parker looked confused for second and then it dawned on her. "Oh..."

Sophie quickly jumped in. "It was to find our guy, it was just business."

Leola gave Eliot a look as he smiled sheepishly. "Yeah I'm sure they were forced to go." She spoke dryly. She shrugged. "It's fine. I'm sure Eliot would be ok if I went clubbing one of these weekends with the girls." She smiled as Eliot opened his mouth to argue but thought better of it.

The team laughed and Eliot sighed in defeat, not happy with this. "It was just business but if you must, I'm good with it."

"Ah you are, are you?"

"Yeah well, if it makes you feel better, Hardison spilled slushee in my car and we had to fight at the bars so technically we weren't enjoying ourselves."

"Oh really? So that's why you were cleaning his truck." She nodded as it all made sense.

"Yeah well I got him back." Hardison slurped up his orange pop and Parker tried to hold in her laughter.

"And how is that?" Leola asked, wondering if she wanted to know.

"Don't even thi—"

"I told the secretary lady that I was Eliot's 'partner' "Hardison grinned and jumped out of reach from Eliot who lunged at him. Leola burst out laughing with Parker.

"IT'S NOT FUNNY!" Eliot lunged at Leola but it just made her laugh harder. She grabbed her sides as she tried to control it.

"Oh that was good Hardison, very nice. I see why everyone wants to kill you."

Hardison chuckled. "Well I also needed a way in so..."

She looked over at Eliot who was not very pleased with this conversation. "You said you weren't going to tell her" he growled.

"Well Parker wasn't suppose to mention the stripper bars" He pointed out.

"Yes but you weren't going to show the pictures." Parker argued back.

Leola just sighed, glad to be back. Sophie walked over and sat down beside her. "Well, this is very interesting."

"Yes, yes it is. I'm gone for a week and Nate was in rehab, Hardison almost got blown up, Parker was on happy pills and Eliot was cheating on me with another man." She laughed at the last part, it was just too funny. "And what about you Sophie? Do anything noteworthy?"

Sophie laughed and showed off her new heels. "Like them?"

Leola agreed. "Those are really nice." They were Gucci heels, gold opened toed with the front part of it scrunched elegantly into a twisted knot. "I have to go shopping with you sometime."

Sophie's eyes lit up. "Well in that case, we shall do it before clubbing." She smiled and then stopped. "Wait are you really going clubbing?"

"Yeah we can if you'd like. We will just force Parker to come along." They both looked at Parker who was looking around in the cupboards. "Well, I should have some dresses she can borrow. It's green and hugs the body with one strap to show off her shoulder. Yeah that should look nice on her." Leola frowned. "I don't have shoes to go with it though."

"Oh I have the perfect shoes." Sophie smiled in anticipation and Leola couldn't help but smile.

"Sounds like a plan." Leola laughed patting Eliot on the shoulder as he growled under his breath. Nate walked into the kitchen and Leola nearly did a double take. He looked worse than before. His eyes were rimmed red and as he said hello, she noticed a very slight slurring. She shook herself out of scrutinizing and managed to hide what she was thinking. "Hey Nate, how are you?"

"Never better." he gave her a loose smile before gulping whatever was in his cup.

They chatted for a while and Hardison's eyes nearly bugged out of his head when Leola mentioned she normally threw her phones away. "You were going to throw it away? Seriously?"

"No not really...look I still have it see? I won't throw anything of yours away. I promise." Leola spoke, trying to get Hardison calmed down. Eliot was enjoying this however.

He snickered and she slapped his arm. "Not nice you."

Eliot nudged her back causing her to scowl at him. He found it funny. "Come on, let's head out."

He took her hand and held it behind his back and he pulled her to the door as quickly as possible. "Uh ok then. Bye" she yelled out barely before Eliot had closed the door.

"And where are we going exactly?" she asked, confused why Eliot wanted to get out.

He shrugged his shoulder thinking. "Dunno." He gave her a playful smile as they got into the elevator and Leola nodded sarcastically.

"Yes well dunno should be a very nice place to visit this time of year, lots of snow." She teased, a smile forming on her lips. Eliot looked at her and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and kissed her. "mmm. What did I do to deserve that?" she asked a little breathless.

Eliot chuckled and kissed her nose. "Just missed you."

Her heart thumped and her eyes locked with his. "I missed you too." She whispered and kissed him this time. The elevator dinged and the door opened.

"ahem." A stern looking man cleared his throat.

"Oh sorry." Leola giggled as her cheeks went a little red. "He's just too sexy not to kiss in the elevator." She stated, patting Eliot on the chest and winking at the stern looking guy as she walked out. The man's jaw dropped and Eliot walked out behind her, nodding his head at the guy, a smug smile on his face.

"How you doing?" Eliot said giving the man a cheeky smile. Leola laughed as the guy just stood there gaping and the doors closed on him.

* * *

A couple days later, Leola decided to hold a dinner for all of them. She never actually sat down and ate with the team so she figured it'd be a good way to hang with all of them. So in the morning She went out grocery shopping, grabbing a big turkey, potatoes, stuffing, cranberries and carrots. She picked up some other side dishes she wanted to make and dessert.

As she walked up to her apartment, she stopped and looked around for the homeless guy Fred but didn't see him. She frowned, since this wasn't like him. She sighed and struggled up the stairs with the grocery and practically fell into her apartment with a big thud. She groaned as she set the groceries down. "Dang Mr. Turkey, how much do you weigh?" She picked them up and started the process of getting Mr. Turkey in the oven. She glanced at the clock and saw it was only nine. She flipped on some music and turned it up loudly. She sang along and got the turkey in the oven and began mixing up the side dishes to put on for later. She was so focused on making the dinner; she didn't notice the door open. As she turned around to grab the potatoes, she saw some footprints on her floor. She stopped and crouched down slightly, her hand clenching around the metal spatula tightly. She tiptoed around the corner but saw nobody. She frowned and went the other way and bashed into someone. She screamed and smacked him on the head with the spatula and tried to knee him but he blocked it. He was screaming something but she couldn't hear over the music. She whipped around and ran into the other room. The music turned off.

"Leola, it's me." Eliot's voice rang out.

Ohhh boy, she thought as she ran back into the kitchen and laughed embarrassed. "Oh god sorry Hun. I thought you were someone else.' She smacked him on the arm. "Don't you not remember the last time you snuck up on me?"

Eliot grumbled. "Kind of hard to forget when a spatula comes flying at you."

She laughed and set the spatula down. "Sorry about that." She walked over and inspected it. He had a red mark in the shape of the spatula. She giggled causing him to glare. She kissed him on the lips and turned around to cover her potatoes to cook later.

"Yeah I'm sure you're sorry." He relied sarcastically, his arms snaking around her waist. "What are you cooking?"

"A turkey dinner for you and the team. I never actually sat down and ate with everyone so I thought why not."

She felt Eliot chuckle. "Did you call everyone?"

She frowned. She didn't think of that. "Actually no I didn't." She looked up at him. "Wanna do that for me?" she gave him her best bright eyed look. He rolled his eyes and kissed her temple before heading to the phone.

She grinned happily and turned back to the stove. She grabbed another pot and put on some eggs to boil. She was going to make mashed potatoes as well as potatoes salad. If they didn't eat it today, she could always eat it for lunch. Or give it to Fred if he came back. An uneasy feeling came over her as she thought of Fred. She didn't know why but she felt something might have happened to him. She shrugged it off, thinking he could have gone for help or decided to wander. He had wandered before. She glanced at the clock and saw it was around twelve. She was surpised; she didnt think she had been in the kitchen THAT long.

Eliot came back and reported everyone can make it for dinner. "I told them I'd beat em up if they didn't come."

She laughed; knowing Eliot would never do such thing. "Why thank you." She walked over and wrapped her arms around his neck. "You're awesome."

He laughed, putting his arms around her waist. "Well like I said, I'm here to make your boring life exciting." He teased, kissing her on the lips.

She pretended to be insulted and playfully slapped him. "My life is not boring!" she gave a mocking huff and turned her back on him.

He wrapped his arms around her stomach, kissing her neck. "You sure about that?"

His kisses sent made her tingle everywhere and her senses were on fire. "Oh..." she trailed off, enjoying his hands as they ran down her body. She turned around and kissed him, her hands undo the buttons of his shirt. He walked backwards out of the kitchen and into the hallway; his back against the wall. "Maybe you're right. Want to make my life exciting now?" she asked slyly, sliding her hand up his shirt, pulling it off in one fluid motion.

He smiled. "What about the food?"

She snorted. "Food? Seriously? It's Mr. Turkey, he must cook all day. He's a big boy. Anyways it's the one food that you can leave to cook while you go and do much more exciting things."

He stared at her for a second and grinned, kissing her. His hands went around her hips and lifted her up and pushing her against the wall, knocking one of the pictures offs the wall. She squealed and laughed and ducked as he tripped over the hamper she had left in the hallway. He burst out laughing. "Ok this is just not working out."

"Well it's interesting." Her eyes twinkled as he set her down and she hooked a finger in the loops of his pants and pulled him into the bedroom, kissing him as he kicked the door closed.

* * *

A couple hours after Parker got a call from Eliot, she started to get fidgety. She wanted to see why leola was throwing the dinner in the first place and besides, she wanted to hang out with Leola. She grabbed her bag and started heading over.

* * *

Leola laid there happily beside Eliot once again, her hands trailing softly on his chest. She felt she needed to say something; how she was feeling but she couldn't. She didn't know why but there was no way she could. So instead she took a deep breath. Eliot noticed and frowned.

"Hey what's going on?" he asked, running his fingers through her soft curls.

"Oh nothing. Just mushy at the moment."

He smiled and gave her a nudge. "Come on, I want to hear it."

She looked up and him and turned around so that she was facing him. "I was just thinking as interesting or boring you think my life is, it's much better with you here." She smiled shyly, biting her lip.

He looked at her directly in the eyes and cupped her face leaning in. She had no idea what he was doing but her heart thudded.

"You're right. Its mushy." He whispered. She laughed, turning red in the face. "But I love it. And you're...amazing." he smiled softly before giving her a gentle kiss. It wasn't what he wanted to say but it would to do. For now.

She covered his hand with hers, deepening the kiss. He wrapped his hands around her and pulled her close. Suddenly a loud beeper went off and they froze. "And of course Mr Turkey needs attention, in the midst of things." She grumbled. Eliot chuckled.

"We can continue later." He replied, giving her a wink.

She laughed, picking her clothes up and throwing them back on. "Sounds good. I will be waiting."

She ran out of the room to check on the turkey. He shook his head and fell back on the pillows and sighed. He knew how he felt about her and it was getting serious. But it wasn't time to tell her. He ran a hand over his face and got up, getting dressed him. He was tired and needed sleep but dreams were back.

Heading out, he saw her working furiously at the turkey, juicing him. "Whoa" he blinked his eyes in surprised. It was BIG turkey.

She turned around. "What?" she asked, eyeing his surprised expression.

"Nothing it's just...he's huge. Where'd you find this guy?" he asked, making her laugh.

"This is Mr. Turkey. I found him at the fresh market. I told you he's a big boy."

He nodded. He never thought it would be THAT big. Suddenly there was Parker. "Whatcha doing?" Parker asked, standing there like she was there all along. Eliot jumped. "Dammit Parker, don't you knock!"

Parker gave him a weird look. "What is it with you people? I know how to pick locks. Besides her door was unlocked."

Eliot roiled his eyes and looked over to see Leola amused. She lifted the turkey, groaning as she struggled to get him back in the oven. Eliot stood, arms folded. Parker looked at him incredulously. "Aren't you going to help her?" she asked.

"He's in." he pointed to the oven where Leola shut the door satisfied.

"That's one big turkey." Parker commented. Eliot agreed. "Yeah I told her that not even five minutes ago."

Leola grinned. "So Parker, you're a bit early for dinner, aren't you?" she teased looking at the clock and doing a double take. It was nearly three now. The day kept getting away from her.

Parker clasped her hands together. "Yes well, I thought if you needed any help, I could...you know..." she trailed off, looking at the stove to see everything cooking and on its way. Leola caught the disappointed look but grinned.

"Actually, I have dinner planned but no dessert. Wanna help?"

Parker smiled. "Love too." She squealed and skipped past Eliot.

"Uh you're letting her cook?"

"No just dessert. No you need to shoo." She said, flapping her arms at him. He laughed but didn't move. She glared at him and put her hands on her hips making him frown.

"Wait you're serious?"

She nodded. She gave him a peck on the lips and nudged him to the door. "I sense Parker came to help for some unknown reason. Bye!"

With that she ran back to the kitchen. Eliot shook his head once again and headed out. He guessed he should be used to her random ways by now.

"So" Parker stood there, looking around. "What are we doing?"

Leola walked into the kitchen and scratched her head. "I really don't know." She looked around and grabbed some things from her cupboards.

Parker looked and grinned at the things she pulled out.

"I know we need to make an apple pie and a chocolate cake but..." she trailed off, looking at Parker's excited expression. "What?" she asked.

"The candy. I know what we should do as well. Can we use the candy?" she frowned not sure.

"Yeah of course, I got tons of it for some reason." Parker gave her a great big smile and they got down to work.

* * *

Eliot headed over to Hardison's. He had asked Hardison to do a check on this Ned guy who lived across the hall from Leola. Knocking on Hardison's door, he heard him holler for him to come in. Eliot rolled his eyes and walked in. of course, Hardison was at his computer.

"Hey what's up?' Hardison asked, flipping the game off.

"Nothing just wondering if you ran that check on Ned."

Hardison gave him a smug look and turned back to his computer, clacking in the keyboards and bringing up some files. "Yes I did but I did not find anything unusual or wrong."

Eliot frowned and walked over to see the files. "Are you sure? Anything, anything that would tip him off."

Hardison gave him a dirty look. "Dude. When I say I didn't find ANYTHING, it means EVERYTHING is NORMAL." He enunciated, annoying Eliot.

"So it's not a false identity or something. He's actually Ned?" Eliot asked. He still had that feeling about him.

Hardison sighed and checked through again. "Yes this identity dates back to his first job. It looks real man. I mean unless he had someone do this and if that is the case, its REAL good."

Eliot scrolled down and smacked Hardison's hand away as he tried to take control of his keyboard. "Uh not sure if you noticed but uh, this is MY apartment, that's MY keyboard and so that mean I rule" Hardison smacked Eliot's hand and whipped his keyboard away and pushed himself away from the desk.

"Dammit Hardison!" Eliot yelled as his hand got smacked. He turned around to yell but Hardison had his hand up. "

"AH!"

"Har-"

"NA!"

"Man wh—"

"No, uh-uh"

Eliot groaned and stayed quiet giving Hardison an absurd look. Hardison just smiled. "That's better. I will keep an eye out if you want but seriously, there is nothing hinky in his records and if this is just an identity, it's REALLY good."

Eliot thought about that. "Well can you check with other hackers in the areas' see who can make such an identity?"

You know that I am like the best right?" Hardison asked, giving Eliot an arrogant look.

"Rigghhht. Anybody else then. Unless it was you that made the identity." Eliot glared at him.

Hardison frowned. "Good point. I will look around. Happy?"

"Yes finally. Thanks." Eliot got up to leave and Hardison had another question. "Is Leola serious about that dinner thing? Or is it a prank?"

Eliot laughed. "It's definitely not a prank and don't eat because the turkey she got is HUGE."

"Right. Ok then." Hardison whirled around to his computer again, his game coming up on the screen.

"You better not miss it." Eliot threatened as he walked out.

"I'll be there at 6"

Eliot shook his head. Hardison got on his nerves a lot lately. Whether it was from lack of sleep or this Ned guy who kept popping up, his patience was running thin.

* * *

"Hey Nate! It's time to go." Sophie walked into Nate's wondering if he had already left.

"In here!" Nate called out from the living room. Sophie sighed. Of course he hadn't left yet.

She walked in to see him in the same clothes as this morning. "Nate, what are you doing? Its five and We have to be there in about forty five minutes."

"I'm not going." Nate replied, taking a drink from his cup.

Sophie sighed and sat down on the chair. "And why are you not going?" she asked.

He just shrugged. "Why not? Everyone else will be there."

"You do know that Eliot made it clear that it was crucial not to miss this dinner right?" Sophie asked, recalling how serious Eliot sounded on the phone. Nate just looked at her. She stayed quiet for a moment. "You know Nate...I know you think that dinners are not a big thing but how long have we known Leola for?"

"My guess would be around five or six months."

"Right. Well...do you think that maybe by making this dinner is a way of her saying she appreciates our friendships?" she looked at him but he gave nothing away. She was going at this the wrong way. "Ok then well what about the rest of us? Hm? You brought us to together to help good people and steal from the rich. You made us that team. You made us family Nate. Are you really not going to the dinner that symbolizes that?"

Nate hesitated before drinking from his cup and sighed. "If this dinner is really so special to Leola and the rest of you, I suppose I can make It." he gave her a long look and smiled. "Let me grab a shower."

Sophie smiled at him, glad that he was going. Whether he was going just to shut her up or because he thought about what she said didn't really matter to her. She just hoped that Nate could see all the good he has done despite what might have not been able to do.

After Nate showered and dressed nicely, Sophie smiled as Nate held the door open for her and they drove over.

* * *

"Hey Parker is the table almost set?" she called out, wrestling with Mr. Turkey.

"Yupp just finished." Parker skipped over happily. "Thanks for letting me help."

"Aw thanks for your help Parker." Leola smiled and gave her a hug. "I'm glad we are friends." She gave her a light squeeze on the arm before heading to change. "Besides I'm pretty sure everyone will like what you made for dessert."

Parker laughed. "I think they will."

Leola stopped and looked Parker over. They were about the same size. "Hey Parker you have no time to go and change and you're covered in flour and butter." Parker looked down at her clothes to see this was true. "Come here. I'm pretty sure I have a dress that will fit nicely on you."

Parker smiled shyly before complying.

Afterwards a knock on the door came and Leola bounced to the door excited. "Hello, hello, hel-"she stopped watching the tense glares between Eliot and Ned.

"Hello Ned nice to see you, Eliot gets your butt in here please honey and Ned, talk to you later, nice seeing you once again but we must go bye!"

She grabbed Eliot's arm and pulled him in and shut the door quickly as she waved. She turned around and smiled, giving Eliot a kiss. "You really should stop picking on the poor guy."

Eliot gave a wry chuckle. "He was coming up the stairs the same time as me. I don't like him and so I let him know. Besides you're mine and I don't like him."

This time she laughed. "Oh the jealous boyfriend? Nice." He gave her a peck on the cheek before shrugging off his leather jacket. She took this moment to a double take at him. His hair was in a pony and he had on a blue button up long sleeved shirt complete with his rugged jeans. She gave him a sideways glance and bit her lip smiling. He turned around.

"What?"

"Oh nothing. You're just sexy that's all." He laughed and walked over and looked her up and down. "You look sexy yourself."

"Why thank you." She laughed as he kissed her, his arms going around her. She quickly pushed him back.

"Parker is here." She looked down the hallway. "Parker! Eliot is here! Come out!" Eliot winced as she yelled by his ear.

"Mind leaving me able to hear?" he asked, shaking his head. She gave him a glare and began down the hallway.

"Come on Parker, you look nice."

Another knock was heard. "Eliot please, go and let them in." Leola called out.

Parker came out looking very sullen. "I want to put on my clothes."

"No you look beautiful." Parker just smoothed the dress. "Ok, we will ask the guys."

Leola grabbed Parker's arm and pulled her to the living room. Leola spied Hardison and smiled. "Hey Hardison. How does Parker look?"

"Why I'm sure she looks fi—"he stopped, turning around. "Wow Parker, you look, uh, you look beautiful."

Parker blushed deep red as Leola grinned. "That's what I thought. You can have the dress. I never wore it and well it's just been sitting there."

Parker looked down at the sleek black little dress she wore. It wasn't fancy but it was enough to say sexy. "Thanks." She smiled at Leola who shrugged.

"You helped with dinner." She put her hands on her hips. "Where are Sophie and Nate?"

Another knock came to the door. "Ah that must be them." Sure enough, Sophie and Nate were standing there. She let them in and took their coats and hung them in the closet.

Sophie smiled and walked over, grabbing a seat at the dinner table. Leola glanced at Nate who gave her a small smile. "Hey Nate thanks."

"Yeah. Well Sophie had me convinced and Eliot threatened to beat anyone who backed out so, I guess I didn't have a choice." He smiled and Leola laughed.

"Yeah I supposed that's true." She said scratching her head.

They all sat down and Eliot took the turkey to the table.

'Whoa! That's a BIG turkey." Hardison eyed the turkey.

"Yes, yes he is. Mr Turkey took a long time to cook." Leola replied.

"Are we supposed eat him? He's huge!" Sophie exclaimed. Even Nate had to laugh. He really was huge.

"Ok let's slice and dice." Eliot spoke, clashing the two knives together. Leola looked at him and then at the rest. "I guess he's cutting the turkey."

They ate a bit of everything; cranberries, mashed potatoes, carrots, mashed turnip, Caesar salad, turkey and dinner rolls.

"Oh my this is excellent! You did this?" Sophie asked and Leola nodded. "I'm used to cooking some big meals. The boys at the group home are never ending pits of hunger."

"Wow this was good thank you." Hardison commented and Eliot agreed. "Yeah thanks."

Leola chuckled. "Oh it isn't over yet." She looked at Parker who began to smile excitedly. "It's time."

She squealed and jumped up, running to the kitchen.

"Wait uh time for what?"

Leola gave Hardison a weird look. "Dessert."

Eliot snickered and Hardison slapped him on the shoulder. Leola got up and helped Parker.

They came back with chocolate fudge cake, jello, cookies, and brownies. The team looked at the desserts with wide eyes and Parker went back into the kitchen as Leola sat down. "Wait there's more?"

Leola nodded, "Its Parker's masterpiece."

Parker came out and the cake was an array of all different colors. It was two layers and covered in rainbow colored frosting. There were smarties rimming the bottom of the cake, cinnamon lips circling above and big sour gumballs at the very top with candy kabobs spring from the cake. There was also a Lego building at one side of the cake and little candy men.

Nate had to laugh; it was impressive. "Well this is definitely the most colourful cake I've seen."

"Like it? Leola and I worked on it all afternoon." Parker was very pleased. "Look. It's the leverage building and there little people are us." she explained pointing to the little candy men and the Lego building.

'Ah that's pretty creative." Nate took a closer look. There was a person on top of the building and one person halfway on the building. On the outside. "What is this?"

Parker grinned. "Leola's surprise remember? That's here halfway and that's me on the building and the rest of you guys are on the ground." She squinted at them. "One day you all will have tried jumping off the building."

"And now it's time to cut the cake." Nate said, trying to distract Parker. The team laughed nervously. Nate cut the cake and everyone had a piece, making Parker extremely happy. Afterwards, they sat chatted up a storm, everyone having a good time. Then they began talking about some of the best thieves.

"no, no, no Hardison. The one who is THE legend is the Ghost." Parker grinned looking at them all mysteriously. Leola's head popped up as she heard the name.

"Oh! I heard about ghost." Sophie joined in. "she supposedly pulled off some of the best heists." Making Parker nod.

"Yeah, didn't she steal something from a corrupt general?" Hardison asked. He only heard vaguely of this Ghost.

Sophie gave Hardison a weird look.

"Yes she did. She is considered to be one of the best. Rumour has it that it was her who stole the general's missing kidney."

Eliot laughed. "Yeah no one ever has seen her supposedly and she could always get in and out without anyone noticing."

Leola didn't say anything but had a rueful smile on her face.

"I would love to meet her one day." Parker mentioned, taking another bite.

"Yeah but didn't she retire or something? No one has heard from her in years." Nate spoke, joining the conversation for the first time.

"True. But any thief would never doubt her existence." Parker replied.

Sophie took one last bite. "Well thanks for dinner Leola. And Parker for dessert. It was nice having everyone together and sitting down." Sophie said, beginning to get up.

"Ah no problem Sophie, I'm so glad you could make it. All of you. It's just my way of saying thanks."

Everyone smiled and nodded. They got up and began carrying the dishes to the kitchen.

"Hey what about turkey?"

"It's Mr. Turkey.' Parker called out. Hardison rolled his eyes.

"Fine. Mr. Turkey." He asked mimicking Parker.

Leola laughed. "Um well if you would like to take the rest of him you can. There is like half of him left."

"Yeah well did you see the size of him? Pfft."

Leola nodded. "Yes that's all I've been hearing all day." She smiled. "Yeah you can take him home Hardison. Just let me put him in a dish."

Leola ripped up the turkey and put the meat into a container for Hardison, as well as lots of dessert. There were a lot of leftovers and if she didn't get them to take some home, she could be eating it for weeks. She gave all of them a dish to take him so that she had only enough leftovers for two days.

'Thanks so much for coming over guys. It meant a lot to me." She smiled as she waved them out.

"You sure you don't want help clearing?" Nate asked, feeling surprisingly happy. He guessed getting together with them was actually a good idea.

"No thanks Nate, I got it. Besides it's a chi thing."

Nate nodded and gave her a quick hug. "Thanks for this." He said, holding up his dish.

She nodded and the rest of the team left. Parker wanted her cake so Leola got her the biggest dish so it would be smushed.

Finally, she sat down on the couch and closed her eyes and sighed. She heard Eliot sigh and drop down beside her. She clasped her hand in his and leaned her head on his shoulder.

"Well that was fun."

Eliot was so tired he didn't have the energy to make a comeback. Leola dreaded cleaning the pots and dishes.

"How about we go to bed? I can clean it up in the morning." Leola asked tiredly.

Eliot smiled down at her before helping her up and they walked to the bedroom together.

**Sorry to have kept you waiting. Please review! I would love to hear what you guys think. :)**


	12. Chapter 12: uprising

**Author's note: terribly sorry for not posting in a long time...I will update on my profile if I wont be able to update. please forgive me! **

**that aside, ENJOY!**

**Ch 12: uprising **

"_This won't work Daemon. It's probably a set up and even so, you're putting everyone in unneeded danger." Eliot argued, as Jonathon and Megan went into the other room. Damon and Eliot always had something to disagree._

"_Yeah, well that's why I'm leading this team in and not you! Now we are going in, we are retrieving the ammunition Intel."_

"_I'm not going." Eliot said, glaring at Damon, staring him down. "And if you put your ego away, you'd see why this job is botched from the beginning."_

_Daemon just smirked. "And your point is? We can do this and we don't need you. All you do is worry anyways."_

_Eliot gave him a disbelieving look and got up and stomped out__._

_He walked out of the room into the corridor where Megan, Jonathon and Bobby were leaning against the walls. Eliot hesitated before speaking. "Heard everything?" _

_Jonathon nodded, swallowing before speaking in a quiet voice. "Look you know Damon...I know he says we don't need you but we do...you're mostly the reason why we are still alive today." He gave Eliot a smile while his eyes begged him to stay._

_Eliot sighed looking at the three of them. "You guys know that you don't have to do this. Now I'm doing what I said- I'm not going." And looked at Bobby since he listened to Eliot as well. "You guys have the choice. Make the right one." _

_Megan sighed angrily, crossing her arms. She was Damon's girl and would follow him to the end the of earth. Eliot looked at Johnathon who looked extremely disappointed. Eliot's heart sank as he knew. Jonathon was Damon's brother and would never leave him._

"_Well. Be seeing you then Eliot." Jonathon patted Eliot's shoulder once before going in to see Damon. Megan smirked at him and followed Jonathon. Bobby merely looked at Eliot before giving a short nod as Eliot walked past. Eliot convinced himself he was doing the right thing but was he? He wasn't sure. _

_The next day, he checked his watch impatiently, knowing the job was beginning. He ran his hand through his hair as he had numerous times before swallowing his coffee-which was still too hot. He spat it out, cursing. "Come on they are fine." He muttered to himself, tapping his fingers against the table he sat. Taking a deep breath, he managed to smile at the waitress in the coffeeshop he was at and blew on his coffee before cautiously taking a sip. Fifteen minutes past before Eliot felt his phone buzz. He quickly answered it, thinking it was Damon._

"_Hello Eliot." Eliot froze. It wasn't Damon. "Why are you not with your...teammates? Lucky for you...but not for them." The sinister voice's laugh echoed in Eliot's head as he set off in a dead run for his car, his heart beating fast. "Let them be okay." He chanted as he screeched down the road to towards the supposed abandoned airfield his team was pulling the job at. _

_Pulling in, he didn't bother to stop at the gate, crashing into it at ninety miles per hours, tearing it clear off its hinges. He swerved onto an air strip his eyes searching frantically for Damon's car as he dialled his number again only to be met by the message center. He spied something and __stomped on the brake, his heart pounding as he watched the car in the other lane of the airstrip. He breathed relieved, glad that nothing happened. Suddenly the car was surrounded. He jumped out of the car but it was too late. _

"_NNOOO!" he yelled, running even as the car flipped and rolled five times and caught on fire. He could hear Bobby__ and Daemon screaming in pain. "Hang on! I'm coming!" _

_He punched out a thug and head butted the other thug, racing towards the fire, hearing his name being screamed in pain. _

"_Eliot! OH GOD!" He heard Jonathon scream. _

"_HANG ON!" his heart beat wildly as he ran as fast as he could. _

_The fire sparked the gasoline and the car blew up. The force threw Eliot back ten feet and the screaming stopped._

"_NO!" he got up dazed and stumbled over closer to the burning car. Two thugs ran at him but he took them down in what seemed like a stupor. _

"_Goddamnit no." he whispered, trying to get to the car but the fire was too hot. He couldn't save them. He refused to do the job and he killed them. A thug came up behind him and wrapped a cord around his neck. He lashed out wildly, trying to slip a hand under the cord and flip the thug over his shoulder. He wasn't going to succeed. He was going to die like the others. He could hear them still screaming his name. "Eliot!"_

"Eliot!"

"ELIOT wake up!" she tried to wake him up.

He thrashed wildly, heaving, tossing side to side. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I killed you. I killed you" he mumbled. His sweaty hands clenched the sheets hard as he shivered, his face pained, his eyebrows furrowed together. "Jonathon" he whispered, before his breathing suddenly became constricted

Leola swallowed her fear and whispered, "Eliot, you need to wake up." She put a hand on his chest. She had to get him awake somehow. She became increasingly concerned when he stopped breathing. "ELIO-OOPMH" She found her back slammed against the bed board, his hand around her neck, pinning her. "Eliot." She spoke as calmly as she could, hoping to soothe him. Her breath was shallow making her voice a bit strained. She took a slow deep breath before speaking again. "Eliot its Leola." She put a gentle hand on his tensed arm, his hand poised carefully around her neck.

He breathed heavily, sweat dripping from his brow. He quieted and looked focused at her as if realizing what he had done. His muscles relaxed and he sat up, gently placing his hand on her neck to examine the damage he had caused.

"Oh sorry, god did I hit you?" he panicked and ran his fingers over her, searching for cuts or swelling. She stopped his hands, kissed them gently and looked directly at him, her eyes searching his.

"No, you didn't, don't worry. And you never would or could." She added, hoping it would help calm his fears. "However, I should tell you, I'm not one for bondage." She smiled trying to make light of the situation. He gave a wry chuckle. He sat up and leaned on to his knees and sigheding, as the dream went away.

She took a deep breath and slid behind Eliot, leaning her chest against his back. She rubbed his arms and shoulders, feeling the tension leave. He caught one of her hands and clasped it with his tightly. She kissed his shoulder to let him know she was there for him.

"That was some dream." She commented, trailing kiss along his shoulder and neck. He took a deep breath and didn't answer. They were getting worse.

She wiped his hair away from his face, hugging him tightly, wrapping her hands on his chest. Eliot's hand resting on her thigh, the other on top of her hands; having her close to him helped. They stayed like that for a while as Eliot tried to put the past away, back in the door he had locked so many years ago. He wasn't ready to tell anybody yet.

"You know what I do if I have a bad dream?" she whispered after his breathing had calmed down.

'What?" he looked over his shoulder at her.

"Horror movies."

"What?" he turned around to see her being completely serious. "You're serious."

"Well yeah, a tub of ice cream and a good over the top horror movie. They usually make them worse than reality, so a horror so it's a good remedy." She shrugged and kissed his cheek. "And I got enough sleep."

He smiled and caught her lips with his. "Thanks." He smiled, resting his forehead and against hers. She sighed dreamily.

"So wanna give it a try?" she asked, running her hand through his hair.

He chuckled. "Yeah why not?"

She pecked him on the nose before jumping up and heading to the kitchen. He sighed and grabbed the pillows and blankets moving them to the couch. She came back with mint chocolate chip ice cream and two spoons. She dropped them on the couch beside him and went through her collection of horror movies. She picked one and popped it in the DVD player.

She stepped up on the couch and sat down beside him, leaning into his side. He had the pillows on the other side propping him up and she covered them both with the comforter. Handing him a spoon, she opened the tub of ice cream.

"Ready to see if it works?" She asked looking up at him, eyes shining.

He took a bite and nodded. "Definitely."

She took a bite too. "Goodie." And she turned the movie on.

She woke up the next morning and found herself in bed. She patted the space next to her but he wasn't there. Frowning, she got up and headed to the living room. She didn't see him so she headed back and he came from the shower, fresh, and clean, and towel wrapped around his lower half exposing his bare muscular chest.

"Hey beautiful." He said giving her a kiss on the forehead as her arms went around him.

"Hello handsome. Did the horror movie work?" she asked, concerned; not whether the movie worked but whether he had another dream or not. She really wished he would tell her but she knew she should let him do so on his own accord. That and he smelt really good after showering.

"Something did the trick." He answered, giving her a smile. He was glad she never asked what the dreams were.

"Ok then. I'm going to grab my shower and then I need to stop by the store; I'm out of milk."

Eliot chuckled. "Yeah that's because I drank the rest." He picked up his pants and looked at her for her reaction. Her mouth and her eyes narrowed on him as Sshe pretended to be insulted.

"How dare you Eliot Spencer." She grinned and headed into the bathroom. She could hear Eliot laughing as he finished getting dressed, left and shut the front door. She hopped into the shower and decided she was going to head over to the group home for the boys.

After her shower, she went to the store and picked up some milk and eggs. She stopped by her aprmtnet and dropped off her groceries and then headed to the boys' home. She called she got out of the shower and dressed, she ran over to the store to pick up the milk Eliot had finish and some eggs. She could help but laugh when she picked up the milk at the conversation she had shared with Eliot earlier. She must have looked like a loon laughing as she held up the milk, but she didn't care. After she was done shopping she dropped it all off at her apartment and began making her way over to the boys home. Traffic was unusually heavy this time of day and she found herself stuck behind a four car pileup. There was no time like the present to give Eliot a call.

"Hey Eliot, I'm already gone for the day but I should be back later on. You wouldn't believe the traffic. Four car pileup and I'm stuck behind it."

"_Hey that's fine and ouch." Eliot laughed. "We are heading to the airport for the first David job. If this goes as planned, I will meet up at your apartment later. Sound good?" __he asked, walking towards Nate's._

She smiled. "Yep sounds like an awesome plan. We should go to a movie or a club or just do something fun tonight. What do you think?"

Eliot laughed. "_Yeah we can do that. Besides I...have something I want to tell you when we meet up alright?"_

She felt butterflies in her stomach. "Yeah sure no problem. I'll talk to you later."

"_Alright. Bye. Beware of the boys."_

"I will." She chuckled and hung up. Everything was good. The thought of Eliot having something to tell her even made the traffic she was in okay. Little did she know the end of the day would bring more chaos.

* * *

On the David job, after Eliot beat up the kid sterling had sent after him, he grabbed his earpiece, gasping for breath, wiping the blood from his mouth.

"Nate, we're blown. We're blown." He limped out of the airport, looking around for any more of sterling's thugs.

"_Eliot, what's going on? Eliot talks to me." _Nate's concerned voice came over and Eliot could hear the car screech to a stop.

"_Hello Nate." _Sterling smug voice came over the comm. As well. Eliot rolled his eyes. It was to be expected. He heard sterling tell Nate what happened and kept silence as sterling spoke to each of his thugs, counting off how many team members he had in his custody. Eliot felt smug inside when sterling asked for him.

"Hey sterling. I got some dental work with your name on it. What do you say you and me hook up so I can give it to you?"

Sterling was only silent for a second before responding. _"It seems that Mr. Quinn was not as effective as promised." _Eliot gave a satisfied grin hearing the annoyance in sterling's voice. That was good.

"_Still two birds in hand are worth more than three in the bush." _He heard sterling give a sinister chuckle and Nate responded "_Eliot lay low."_

Eliot took the ear piece out of his ear and made his way carefully to his car. He had another place he could hideout until Nate came up with w plan. He made a face as he tasted the warm metallic taste of blood in his mouth and tried to spit it out. He sighed knowing it failed and got in the car. His stomach clenched as he thought of Leola. Knowing her she was making lunch for the household of boys, trying to calm down the worker helping her. He couldn't help but worry. Would sterling go after her? Did he know about her? What if he already had her? He tried rationaling it in his head. If sterling had Leola, then he would have mentioned it. If only he didn't take the earpiece out so soon...

He put the car in gear and winced as he tried to look behind him to reverse. He looked the mirrors instead and raced down the road to the highway. He needed to check.

* * *

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING!"

Leola cringed as she heard a scream. She raced down the hallway and up the stairs but got bulldozed by two boys jumping down. She gasped in surprise and tried to grab the railing but she lost her footing and of course because she grabbed the railing, she tried falling towards the railing...only to have overshot it and flipped OVER the railing instead. She dropped to the ground with a loud thud and groaned as pain shot up her hip and elbow. She flipped on her back, counting down from ten, closing her eyes.

The two boys stopped and walked over to Leola who was lying still on the ground. "You knocked her over dude." The blonde boy said. The other widened his eyes in horror and shook his head so hard, his red mop of hair stuck up everywhere.

"That was NOT me. You were closer to her." he argued, shoving the blonde headed boy.

Leola sighed quietly before opening her eyes, giving them both a sly smile. "Hello boys."

They stopped arguing and looked down at her with wide eyes. None of them moved until the other worker, Emily came roaring over the stairs, her hair covered in white foamy stuff. They all turned their eyes at Emily and then back at each other. Leola acted first, jumping up and trying to snatch one of them, a smile still on her face. The boys shrieked and ran into the kitchen faster than Leola had giving them credit for. She stopped, turning around trying to sooth Emily.

'THEY PUT SHAVING CREAM IN MY HAIR" she screeched, her face turning beet red. Leola adverted her eyes and bit her lip hard to keep from laughing. This was a terribly serious matter. She drew in a long breath, trying to keep her face neutral.

"I'm sure they didn't mean it. BUT I will talk to them, rest assured." She spoke quickly as Emily opened her mouth angrily. "Why don't we go upstairs and I will help you wash it out. AND hide the shaving cream this time. She gave Emily a smile and Emily muttered angrily under herr breath. "Fine" Leola heard her say and as soon as Emily stomped back up the stairs, she turned around, unable to keep from laughing.

"I CAN HEAR YOU LAUGHING!" Emily shouted down the stairs, sounding quite annoyed. Leola stifled them the best she could but Emily looked comical, her dark brown hair completely covered in shaving cream. It was like an afro. After she managed to contain herself a little bit, she did her absolute best to look angry as she walked up the stairs to help Emily. She went in the bathroom to see Emily leaning over the bathtub, trying to run her long hair under the water.

"here." Leola gave a chuckle as Emily relinquished and hung onto the tub instead.

"I'm going o kill those boys one day." Emily's voice was muffled under the sound of the water. Leola giggled. "Yeah aren't we all. Just gotta be loose. They have a hard time and well, here they have a tendency to be more trouble than they should be. But trust me they are good."

Emily snorted in disbelief. Leola finished rinsing and turned the water off, scrunching the water out of Emily's hair. Emily flipped her hair back and looked at Leola, her eyebrow raised. "Oh really? That's why they don't bother you?"

Leola smiled. "Well they still torture me but I have learned most of their tricks." She put a hand to her sore hip, grimacing. "However, I still have yet to remember to dodge out of the way when I hear them coming."

This earned a smile from Emily. Emily nodded as she brushed out her hair. "okay." She looked thoguthful. "So you're saying they torture you until they like you and then you're safe?"

Leola laughed. "Well not technically safe but they are less likely to pick on you yes." Emily grinned. "Fine. I can wait them out. But first." she picked up the can of shaving cream and put it behind the towels in the bathroom closet. "I will learn from them."

Leola nodded, patting Emily on the shoulder. "I have a feeling you will stick around." Emily laughed and shook her head. "That's if I lose my mind eh?" Leola agreed.

Leaving Emily to finish brushing her hair, she hummed as she skipped down the stairs to find the guilty boys. She did her very best to put on a stern face as she walked into the kitchen. She walked in to find them standing nervously, nudging each other in ribs. As she took a good look at them, she saw wit was Ethan and peter. She gave a disappointed sigh before leaning closer. "You think you guys can lay off her for a little while? You already made the other one quit."

The boys grinned evilly until she gave them a glare. "Come on, you had your fun, let her get used to you guys. Its hard find people to work with you mischievous boys."

She gave them a knowing smile before ruffling Ethan on the head. "So can you? Steer clear of her? Or I will have Zack put spiders in your beds." She felt satisfied, seeing the grins wiped off their face. "Just kidding...sort of...just be nice ok?"

They nodded giving her a smile before running outside. Leola shook her head. She could never get mad at them seriously. Even though she normally paid the price. She rubbed her hip, still hurting. She knew they would listen.

She stepped out on the porch, to check on the boys playing outside. So far everything seemed good. Inhaling deeply, she smiled and went inside to help Emily with the laundry.

* * *

Eliot didn't stop at the house, to check in; he only needed to catch a glimpse of her. Sure enough she stepped outside on the porch, keeping an eye on the boys. She grinned happily and walked back inside. Eliot sighed relived, releasing his tight grip on his steering wheel. Maybe sterling didn't know about her after all. He turned around and headed back the way he came. He shouldn't see her yet; just in case. Nonetheless, he called her anyways.

The phone rang a few times before her voice came on. "_Hello handsome" _Eliot didn't speak just yet, not sure what he wanted to say. He only needed to hear her voice, so soothing and beautiful. "_Hmm. I can hear you breathing." _She paused before her voice came concerned. _"Eliot, your breathing sounds shallow. Are you ok?" _

"Hey yeah, I'm good." He tried keeping his voice normal but he couldn't. But of course he couldn't if she was a mark.

_You're lying Hun. What's up?"_

"nothing, just um...I uh...may not come over tonight...still dealing with the first David job...taking uh, longer than expected..." he trailed off, cursing himself silently. The one time he needed to lie and he couldn't do it convincingly. She stayed quiet for a moment before finally speaking.

"_Okay. See you when you finish up then." She replied and _Eliot nodded, not even realizing that she couldn't see him nod. "_Eliot?'_

He blushed. "Oh sorry forgot you couldn't see me, yes I mean." She laughed but she still sounded worried.

_Do you need anything?" _she asked concerned, not wanting to press in his space, especially since he was keeping something from her.

"No, we should be okay. I will see you later." He cleared his throat. "_okay." _She spoke neutrally this time and Eliot couldn't help but feel grateful she gave him his space. The other women he dated were always clingy, always needed to be in on everything.

He hung up and gave a relaxed sigh. Now they just needed to figure out how to get out of this mess.

**Hope you enjoyed!**

**Please review! :)**


	13. Chapter 13: Falling apart

**Author's note: ****Enjoy and please review! I would love to hear from you. **

**By the way, although the story traffic is back up, It's still not working...anybody else having this problem or is it just me? I have no way of telling if anybody reads my chapter now :| So please review! :)**

**Also, I do not own anyone from leverage, except Leola**

**Chapter 13: Falling apart**

Things were going badly. Their plan went kaput when Sterling captured Hardison and Parker and on top of that, Eliot was injured now and Nate found out that it was because of Sophie they were caught. Nate sighed and rubbed his face as he frantically raced his mind to come up with a plan. Sophie sparked an idea that came to his mind however when they were in her storage space. Now he managed to calm himself down a bit and think it through. It was crazy but then, that is what his team did. If sterling knew how each of them thought, then they should think as another person. Hopefully it worked. He relayed this to Sophie and Eliot who nodded and agreed.

"Eliot. I need to talk to you for a minute before we go and pull this off." Nate spoke; staying behind as Sophie gave him a sigh and nodded, leaving the room. She couldn't change Nate's mind, when Nate mentioned it earlier.

"Yeah sure." Eliot came and sat at the table, leaning back in his chair, careful not to jostle his ribs too much.

"You know that once this is done, we are all going our separate ways, head out of the country for a while, lay low until things cool down." Nate replied, cautiously.

Eliot frowned and nodded. Of course he knew this; it was the standard thing to do after covers were blown. "Yeah that was typically the plan right? I mean you get out, lay low and come back once the heat dies down."

Nate nodded and rubbed his chin. "But you see Eliot...your departure might be a little different. We all have ties here but they are temporary. They can be cut and rejoined later on." It suddenly dawn on Eliot. "You have a definitive tie though." Nate was trying to be as gentle as he could.

"You're talking about Leola." Eliot stated his tone not so pleasant. Nate nodded. "What about her, it's all going to be..." he knew where Nate was coming to now. She could come but he could put her in more danger than if she stayed here. If she stayed away from him.

"Sterling doesn't seem to know her. Otherwise he would have used her as well to get to you." Nate spoke quietly, letting Eliot run this over in his mind. "It would be safer for her to stay in this case, before sterling makes the connection."

Eliot's grip on his arms tightened. He knew what Nate was saying was right and he was just saying it because he cared. However, it still hurt and still made him angry. Nate patted Eliot on the shoulder and told him he would see him later. However, Eliot didn't answer him, he couldn't speak. He had too many things to think over. All he knew was that he needed to clear his head. With a sigh, he rubbed his forehead and decided to go for a walk.

* * *

Leola grinned happily as she kicked off her shoes and flipped the TV on. Eliot would be coming over tonight and she couldn't wait to hear what he wanted to say to her. It sparked her interest and made her heart thump loudly. Muting the TV and turning on some music, her thoughts were dedicated to Eliot.

While she cleaned, her phone buzzed and looking down, she saw it was Eliot. She smiled widely as she answered the phone. "Hello handsome. Was just thinking about you." She chuckled

At first Eliot didn't speak, unable to say what he needed to. But he felt it was the right decision and the faster he got this over with, the safer she would be. _"Hey Leola. Listen...there's no easy way to say this but I'm leaving. The job was blown and now we all are separating and getting out of town." _

Leola's smile diminished as the gravity of the situation took over. "Eliot? What happened? And what do you mean you're leaving? Where are you?" she looked at her phone to make sure someone wasn't pranking her.

"_The first David job, we got caught. But we're safe for now._" He said quickly, calming any fears that alarmed her. _"But I have to go..."_ he trailed off, unsure what to say.

She choked on her words and she tried her very best to swallow the painful lump in her throat that seemed to grow by the second. She finally managed to speak, her voice steady thank goodness. "Eliot...what are you doing?" she whispered.

She heard Eliot sigh heavily on the other side of the phone call and squeezed her eyes shut, her head beginning to throb.

"_Its's best Leola. I...I have to leave. Sterling is after us-all of us yet he doesn't know about you. You're safe and that's the way you should be, safe." _

She felt anger boiling up out of nowhere and she nearly shouted. "Oh safe? Are you serious Eliot? SAFE? I'm a thief for Christ sakes and you know damn well that any of our lives are not safe so that's bullshit." She surprised herself, cursing away. "You decide to leave without consulting with me first; just decide what is best for me, without asking ME what I think? I am a grown woman, who has been making her own decisions for a long time. What the hell, Eliot and above all, how dare you tell me this on the PHONE!" she was livid now, absolutely livid. She paused but Eliot was speechless. He had never heard her swear and never saw her lose her control over her anger, maybe except when they had first met and now he was discovering she had held back. "In what way did you think that making this decision without me was okay?" her voice was softer now and her heart was heavy. "Because you seriously need to let me in. We can get through this, trust me this is nothing compared to some things guys have put me through." She gave a dry chuckle thinking of the things she endured as a result of Parker's surprise. "Can...Can you just come over?" she looked out her window to see if he was around. Knowing him he would be on the other side of the city or possibly already gone.

"_I'm sorry Leola. I can't come over, I, uh...I am really sorry Leola." _His voice was pained. She squeezed her eyes shut and turned from the window.

"And how long should you be gone?" she asked, only dimly aware now that her head was throbbing painfully.

"_Depends on how long he looks for us" _

Leola sighed, sitting down on her couch as she took this all in. Eliot stayed silent as she processed the information. "You should have waited to discuss your decision with me." She said quietly, making Eliot wish he had never said anything in the first place. She should be angry at him. Swearing like she was a minute ago. Now she almost sounded like he had betrayed her.

"_I know Leola." _He let out a heavy breath, wincing at his throbbing ribs_. "I'm so sorry. Everything just happened really fast and the usual action to take is-"_

"To pack up and get out, lay low and come back later." She finished for him, understanding but angry nonetheless. She had it under control for now. "But where in that does it say to leave me behind."

Eliot spoke in a whisper, frowning_. "Yeah. Listen uh...I'm just wondering where this leaves...us." _he gritted his teeth, not wanting to hear the answer, afraid that that he wouldn't have a chance. He regretted not going over to her and talking it out now.

Leola sighed, blinking back the tears. She was pretty angry at the moment and her head was pounding. She couldn't think straight. "I don't know, Eliot. I just don't know where this leaves us now. How about I just tell you when you come back," she said finally.

Eliot swallowed. It was better than he had hoped.

"You need should have trusted me enough to make this decision with me, together." She paused for a second feeling the tears well up her eyes. "Trust is a huge thing Eliot and you didn't trust me. God that hurts that hurts so much Eliot." She paused again to try to hold back her tears but it was getting harder and harder. "You never had to tell me anything you didn't want to, I never forced you to talk to me. I didn't care that you would shut me out of things; I let you do what you need to do. I don't care that you did things in your past that you don't want me know, or that you're a hitter. I could care less if you were a clown that went around with a vender hot. I'll I care about is you." She heard Eliot breath and knew she hit a soft spot. But he was silent as Leola figured he would be. Her anger was boiling up again. Remembering back, she asked angrily "is this what you were waiting to tell me?"

Eliot hesitated. He could tell her now how he felt about her but then that would be cruel, telling her then leaving anyways. No what he was doing was much kinder and it was what was best. At least that what he kept telling himself."_No but that's not important at the moment." _He paused for a moment. _"I'm sorry Leola; I left you out of this decision. But I'm sticking to it because I think its best. Goodbye"_

"No wait a minute Eli-"the phone clicked dead and she groaned in frustration. Throwing her portable phone at the wall she grabbed her cell phone that Hardison made and tried to dial Eliot's number in hopes of tracking his whereabouts. Her fingers fumbled and felt stiff as she tried. After what seemed hours, but were only minutes, she managed and the phone began tracking...only to tell her that Eliot's phone had been disconnected.

At that moment she laughed a hurt laugh. Thinking to herself; of course, it would be disconnected; she already would have done so why wouldn't he have. She took a deep breath trying to steady her emotions but it was too late. The tears she had been fighting began to fall rapidly and they were matched by heavy sobs.

* * *

Eliot hung up the phone shakily and quickly took it apart. She sounded mad. No doubt she'd try to track him. He put a gentle hand on his tender ribs and threw his bag into he car. He felt horrible and all he wanted to do was go back and take her with him. But he knew he wouldn't. It wasn't the right thing to do. He drew in a shaky breath and got in the car. He thought about the other members of his team and the memories started wheedling their way back.

He couldn't save the other team because he had walked away. This time, he needed to walk away in order to save them. He took a deep breath and with a heavy heart, he drove away; out of the city, away from Leola.

* * *

Leola jumped up; nearly tripping over the books always scattered on her floor and grabbed her car keys. She needed to check the leverage office. Someone had to still be around. She need to find out what happened; why the sudden change in Eliot.

She got in her car and drove as fast as she could possibly go without hitting anyone. She wiped angrily at the tears that were still falling down her cheeks and screeched to a stop when she saw the office. Her heart nearly stopped and she gripped the wheel, her knuckles white. She got out of the car and ran to the office, only to be stopped by the officers containing the scene.

"No please, my friends work in there." She spoke, panicking as she looked up at the burning floor of the building, already charred and destroyed.

"Sorry ma'm you're going to have to wait here." she pushed them away and walked along the side of the tape to see if she could catch a glimpse of anything.

A man came over, with suspicious eyes. "Are you alright?" he asked silkily.

She looked at him and felt uncertainty run through her and something nagged her in the back of her mind to lie. "I have some friends who work a couple floors below that one." She bit her lip and he nodded. "Ah everyone got out safely. No one was hurt."

She exhaled relieved. "Name is Jim sterling." She caught herself in time before she turned at stared at him. She forced herself to give a nice smile and shake his hand.

"Cathy Jullim, nice to meet you." He shook her hand and smiled.

"Listen if you know anything about that floor that burned down, please let me know."

"Wait, what happened? Just curious." She asked.

"They are a team of thieves that steal from other people. I've been on them and nearly caught them but they slipped through my grasp. Anyhow, they are dangerous, so I would suggest you keep your distance if you come across them."

She gritted her teeth, refraining from retorting something that would tip this Jim sterling off. She stayed silent, a little shocked after hearing what Eliot said was true. She cleared her throat and crossed her arm giving Sterling her best concerned look. "I had just hired them to help me with a problem I'm having."

"Well I would highly suggest you find another company to help you with your problem." Sterling replied looking her over.

She just nodded and walked away without saying anything. It crossed her mind that it might have ticked this Jim Sterling person that something wasn't right but she didn't care at the moment. She would deal with that if it ever came to that. She walked over to her car and absentmindedly drove back to her apartment, at the speed limit for once. She parked, went upstairs and closed her door.

She stared out her window for the umpteenth time and tried to force the lump in her throat down. She tried tracking his cell; she tried following the traffic cams from her apartment but to no avail. Hell she even went over to his apartment but he was gone; no trace of him. She couldn't understand why he would have made this decision without her. Yes, she would have fought him just as hard as she did if he had involved her but they both would have been better off. She needed to know why this decision was made, showing he didn't trust her enough. She wracked her brain and hazily saw Nate come up in her mind. It suddenly dawned on her.

She grabbed her purse and brushed the tears away quickly as she ran out the door and jumped into her car, tires squealing as she raced over to Nate's. She became angrier and angrier as she ran up the steps, not bothering to take the elevator. She stopped at Nate's apartment just about ready to knock. Her face hardened and she kicked it open instead.

Nate stopped packing as soon as he heard the door open with a bang. Cautiously he turned around and saw a very angry Leola in his doorway. She was breathing hard, her eyes burning a hole through him. He could feel her seething from where he stood.

"What...Did...You...Do." She asked her voice low and barely controlled. Nate sighed and rubbed a hand over his face.

"I'm assuming you mean about Elliot." He stated and judging by Leola's unchanging glare, he was dead on. He was actually a little nervous being in the same room as her at the moment. She was quite scary.

"We got made on the first David job. Things went more than a little sideways and we barely got out of there. We decided th-"

"No I'm talking about what you said to Eliot personally." She interrupted her voice level and coo nowl. "You said something to him; something that made him makes up his mind, something more personal Nate."

Nate nodded. "Yes, yes I did say something but only for the safety of the team. I told him about connections and that they could be reconnected after the heat is gone. You of all people should know that being a thief yourself." Nate spoke cautiously

She scoffed. "What you mean leave and cut every connection you had until its safe in order to leave no trail behind. It seems YOU are the one forgetting that I'm a thief, not a civilian." Her words were bitingly harsh and it was meant to be.

Nate sighed. "Eliot knew the risks Leola. He knew that he could leave you out of the problem we seem to have created for ourselves; keep you from getting hurt. Sterling is a ruthless man. I'm sure you heard of him." He paused gauging Leola's reaction. It remained unchanged. "So I told him my advice about waiting it out and then coming back. It wouldn't have been fair to you or to him to have to run if Sterling didn't know about you."

Leola gave a sad smile, her eyes softening and filling up with tears. "See that's where you're wrong Nate. That decision should have been up to Eliot and me. Not made by some measly advice from you. He should not have been making up his own mind and telling he was leaving on the PHONE." She spoke bitterly and made a face at him. Turning around to leave, she stopped and looked to the side. "For both our sakes Nate, I sure hope you're right in your mindlessly stupid advice and that you and I never run into each other in the near future." She looked around the apartment of Nate's one last time before softly speaking. "You destroyed my relationship. I hope you can live with that." She walked out the door leaving Nate frozen on the spot wondering if what Leola said was true.

Perhaps it should have been up to Eliot. His mind raced wondering if Sterling in fact knew about Leola or if he did actually ruin one of the most stable relationships Eliot had probably ever been in. Guilt washed over him and he angrily threw his clothes in the suitcase. He grabbed his phone and tried calling Eliot but it was already out of service. He gave a sigh and finished packing. He hoped that he wouldn't see Leola anytime soon or there would be hell to pay. He had never seen that look in her eyes before and it reminded him of the one is wife gave him after they split up. Nate knew all too well hell have no fury than a woman scorned.

* * *

Leola let the tears flow uncontrollably as she gunned her car down the highway. It always helped her but it wasn't now. She had no idea what to do now. Her whole life was in the team. Parker, Hardison, Sophie, and Eliot. And of course Nate. She absolutely hated him with fury. Sadness came over her anger and she felt exhausted. There was no use; she tried tracking down the others but they were already packed and gone. She should have known Eliot waited until they were done and ready to move.

Soon a plan came together. She still had that job offer from the hospital and she needed to work down that the boys' home until they found another person to hire. Her tears slowly began to stop as she found all the way s to fill her time. She also had that three week job in Ireland she had thought about taking. Now that there was nobody here holding her she might as well go. She sighed as she changed gears again, tearing down the highway. Once again, she was alone.

Whether it was minutes or hours that she reached her apartment, she didn't know. She walked it and slammed the door close, slumping down. Leverage was gone. They were no longer a team and she was alone. Whether Eliot did break up with her or not, it made no difference.

She leaned her head down and cried.

**Heatbreaks and heartaches...*sigh*...never ever easy to deal with **

**Please review!**


	14. Chapter 14: evening

**Author's note: This follows the last chapter.**

**Saides- Thanks and I hope all is well with you too ****(forgot to answer in the last chapter sorry!)**

**Socialoutcastwinneroftheyear- Thanks! :D**

**And thanks to those who have added me to their favourites/alerts. That makes me really happy. :)**

**Last of all, I do not own anything from Leverage except for my characters like Leola. **

**Without further ado, ENJOY!**

**Chapter 14: Evening**

She got up and put the kettle on, finally calming down from the whirl of chaos. The entire day seemed like a dream but was entirely too real.

She went to the living to get her tea that she had set earlier when she first got home and looked out the window as the sun was beginning to set. She remembered the time when she first went with Zack pick pocketing and nearly got caught. They both laughed and afterwards, she had lectured him on bad behaviour, and all the while, Zack couldn't help but point out that she was a contradicting herself. She grumbled. "Only want you to do your best."

She began to smile as she remembered Zack had picked up a wooden ball out of a shopping cart and hid it underneath his coat, giving it to her as a present when they headed back to the home. It was a wooden ball with a printed sun design etched all around it. It was around here somewhere. Still holding her tea, she began looking for it. Throwing things up from off the floor and throwing clothes in a corner. Her hand closed on a shirt, soft and worn out and her breath hitched. It was Eliot's. Her smile disappeared and she gulped her tea, forgetting it had gone cold. She gagged as the cold bitter taste of the tea hit her tongue and she swallowed in distaste. She shuddered and dumped the rest out and put the kettle on for more. She took a drink of water to rinse out the unpleasant aftertaste it left in her mouth. She felt sadness creep on her again, and she tried to brush it away. She grabbed the shirt, throwing it in the hamper. She could deal with it later, after the initial shock period has passed.

A knock came on the door and Leola lit up. Just maybe it was Eliot and this whole thing truly had been a dream. She opened the door and her happiness faded, leaving curiosity in its wake; to see none other than Sophie Deveruaux.

"Hey Leola! Didn't think I'd leave without saying goodbye did you?"

Leola chuckled and scratched her head. "I don't exactly know what to expect today." She answered truthfully. "It's been one heck of a not so good day."

Sophie came in, her smile disappearing as she studied Leola's expression. "Eliot left didn't he." Sophie said, but it sounded like a statement rather than question.

Leola nodded, feeling horrible; as if a piece of her heart was missing. "Yeah, I spoke to him a couple hours ago." She scrunched her face up as if in thought. "I tried tracking him but he was already gone." She looked back at Sophie and cleared her throat. "I tried tracking you guys too but nothing so I figured you all must have left already."

Sophie smiled. "No that's Hardison's doing. He scrapped anything that would leave a trail and disconnected our phones and gave us new ones. He is extremely thorough."

Leola's heart sank once again knowing that Hardison and Parker most likely left before Eliot. She ignored it and agreed. "Yeah I saw the leverage office. Love what you guys have done with the place." She said sarcastically.

Sophie laughed. "Yeah, the new decor was to throw Sterling off."

"Yes Jim Sterling." Leola spoke, like she was eating something sour. Leola smiled meekly though and offered Sophie some tea, which she gratefully accepted. They sat down on the couch and drank their tea in silence.

Sophie felt horrible, as if she should have stopped Nate from speaking to Eliot. She didn't know if it would have made a difference but Eliot would have come up with a decision on his own. One that probably would have been better than the one he chose. Knowing Leola, she would have had a hard time with the decision.

"So how are you doing?" Sophie asked quietly.

Leola didn't answer at first, trying to sort out her feelings. "You know...sad, angry, betrayed, happy sort of, because you guys got out and are safe but...confused a bit. And angry." She gave Sophie a sad smile. Sophie patted her hand sympathetically.

"What happened?" She asked taking another sip of her tea.

"Well, he told me he was leaving, and keeping me here so that I'm safe...on the phone."

Sophie winced. "Ouch. I would have been mad."

Leola nodded, giving an embarassed chuckle, her cheeks turning red again. "Well I was. I sort of swore at him. And then asked him to come and see me so we could figure it out. But his mind was made up." Leola sighed, feeling her eyes beginning to well up again. In order to keep herself calm she took a sip of her tea. "I just wished he trusted me enough." Leola smiled sadly and looked away.

Sophie took a deep breath. It sounded like she wasn't just talking about the phone call. Eliot did have trust issues but Sophie wouldn't dare interfere. She saw what damage it has caused. Instead she decided to help smooth things.

"Yes, but you two are unique." Leola looked back at Sophie as she explained. "I don't think Eliot has ever had stable relationship like yours too often. And he is, Eliot after all. There is bound to be a few problems." Sophie chuckled and Leola smiled genuinely.

"true." Her smile disappeared again. "But it doesn't make it hurt any less."

Sophie agreed, taking a sip of her tea. "I know. But...he does love you."

This caught Leola's attention. Sophie smiled, propping her elbow on the back of the couch. 'What you think he didn't? Jeez he's a ladies' man; I've seen him on a few of our jobs before he met you. And now he's well, pretty much the same but calmer or happier. Not so grouchy. Well something is always irking Eliot but since he's met you he's happier." Sophie laughed. Leola just pondered this, running a hand through her long curly hair. "The fact that he left proves that he really cares for you. If he didn't care for you then he wouldn't have followed through... right?"

Leola grumbled. "I suppose so."

Sophie smiled. "And he did. Ok, just give Eliot the chance. I know it may seem like he doesn't deserve one but his actions will become clear one day. They always do in every relationship."

Leola looked at her sharply before adverting her eyes elsewhere. "I will take it into consideration. I told him I would let him know where we stood after he got back."

This brought Sophie's spirits back up. There was hope after all. "That's good."

Sophie finished her tea and walked over to the kitchen. Leola did the same, her eyes downcast. "I do love him. I never told him but I do." Leola confessed, emptying her cup and washing it.

Sophie's heart swelled and she walked over giving Leola a big hug. "Then you two can make it work." She whispered comfortingly. Leola was good for Eliot and he was for her. Truth be told, Sophie really wanted things to work out between them.

Leola nodded, blinking the tears back before they had a chance to fall. "Sounds good."

"I have go." Sophie relied, not too happy with that. Leola nodded again. "Yes that's fine. Thanks Sophie. For everything and be safe."

Sophie gave her another hug and said goodbye. Leola's apartment was empty once again. Leola's heart didn't feel as heavy though and she felt a little better, knowing that Sophie believed in Eliot and yet understood where Leola was coming from. She was more than thankful nobody asked what happened with Nate. She felt ashamed but angry at Nate at the same time. But anger overpowered her shame. She looked around her apartment, her spirits rising and set to cleaning. She could do things to fill up her time. She could always go back to working as a nurse, she needed to work at the boy's home, and she had seen a couple jobs she wanted to pull. Leola began to hum, looking forward to being busy. Lifting the blankets off the back of the couch, one of them slid behind. She dropped the other blankets down on the floor a little frustrated and pulled the couch out. Leaning over, she stretched her hand down, patting the floor for the missing blanket. Something thudded against the wall as her hand closed on something hard and round. Mystified, she pulled it up, the blanket forgotten. It was the wooden ball Zack had given her. Slowly but surely, a genuine smile grew on her lips. She could get through this.

**Hoped you enjoyed it and don't forget to review! I would love to hear from you. **

**Also, the next chapter should be up in about a week :)**


	15. Chapter 15: The call

**Author's Note: I may not be able to update until two weeks; sorry for the delay and please hang in there. I will try my best however to complete chapter 16 before then.**

**Also, thank you to those who added me to their alerts and faves...makes me SUPER happy :)**

**saides- Thanks! :D**

**without further ado...enjoy**

**Chapter 15**

"ZACK" Leola screeched as she opened her purse to find...juice. She made a face as she lifted out her day planner. That was going to have to be replaced. Zack came down over the stairs, a look of pure innocence written across his face. Leola scrunched her eyes at him. "You can quit that "oh but I'm so innocent' look."

Zack feigned innocence for a few more seconds before aughing his head off at Leola's exasperated expression.

"You're losing your touch again." He said, trying hard to stop laughing.

Leola glared at him. "No I am not. I am merely testing your attack/defence system." She gave a smug grin. "I must say, your attacks haven't changed over the years." She held up her purse as an example. "Besides ruining a purse I have become quite fond of, you managed to get Ethan to 'juice' Jane's cell phone and have her call it a quits on me." She gave him a pleasant look, her smile getting bigger and bigger. As her smile got bigger, Zack's got smaller and smaller. He began to look suspicious. "You can take Ethan and Bobby with you when you go to that basketball game." She said sweetly, as Zack's face became filled of horror. He shook his head no.

"Not happening. Nope, nu uh not happening dude. NO WAY" he waved his hands dramatically and Leola was suddenly reminded of Hardison. She brushed back the thought and continued.

"Oh come on Zack. Please? For me? They've been wanting to go and with the other worker you drove to quitting, AGAIN, I'm short. Besides Emily can't come in until later." She gave Zack her big eyes, hoping he would say yes. Zack groaned, making Leola grin. "You're the best Zack." She gave him a hug and he continued to grumble under his breath. "Think about this next time you want to teach any of the boys' tricks to play on unsuspecting workers. They are here for your benefit you know."

Zack rolled his eyes and sat down at the kitchen table. "I know but they are fun to pick on. Besides we help create masterpieces like you." He teased, grinning as he gulped down his orange juice.

Leola turned around and raised an eye at him. "I'm your masterpiece?" she asked sarcastically.

Zack ignored her look and nodded. "yupp." He looked at his watch and sighed. "I guess I will get the two of them ready."

Leola grinned as he slumped out of the kitchen...only to yell up the stairs excitedly, telling Ethan and bobby to get their butts downstairs. Zack came back to the kitchen, looking forlorn once again. Leola pretended to be serious and washed the dishes.

"I must say you win. You haven't lost your touch...yet" Zack said giving her a sly smile.

Leola laughed, and turned around, leaning against the counter. "And I won't ever Zack. Better get used to it. And quit bugging the others who work here. Do you honestly want me here more than I am?"

Zack gave her a mischievous smile; an evil glint in his eye. "We will see then. And yes I agree, you are here too often "he replied as they both saw bobby and Ethan hollering down the stairs and slipping their muddy shoes on, walking on her nice clean floor.

"Oh come guys, you know the rules! No muddy shoes in the house." She looked helplessly at her ruined floor. At least it would give her something to do.

"sorry." They both said in unison and Leola sighed. They sounded so sincere. But she took into consideration they've been hanging with Zack...they could be faking.

She grumbled to herself. She was getting paranoid. "Fine fine. Just shoo and have fun. Zack call me when you get there okay?"

Zack gave her a salute, grinning from ear to ear again. Leola rolled her eyes and shook her head as they slammed the door, making her cringe. It would be nice if the door was left on its poor hinges.

Alone for a little while, she left the dishes and cleaned up the mud in the hallway. She took the cloth and the bucket into the laundry room and put another load in the washer. Turning it on, she hummed as she walked back to the kitchen, cleaning the dishes. Not even ten minutes later, she heard weird bubbling noises coming from the laundry room. Not thinking, she just walked in and slipped on her butt. Before she figured what was happening, she was swamped by foaming bubbles, frothing everywhere and she was blinded. She squealed as she tried to crawl her way out but instead, hit her head off the dryer. She slid over to the washer next to it, and smashed her hand on the off button, the loud churning machine shutting down. "Oh fudgy buckets and falaffle trunkets!" her mouth filled with soap and she spat it out, blowing a hole through the soapy blanket. Getting an idea, she blew as hard as she could until she could see the door. She crawled out into hallway, flopping herself against the wall. Taking deep breaths, she looked over to see the soap spilling out into the hallway. Her phone rang.

"_I assume you did laundry by now?" _Zack's voice, tinged with amusement.

Leola gritted her teeth. "This is war you know."

Zack cackled. "_Enjoy! I wish I had a picture of you right now. I imagine you are covered with soap hehe" _the phone clicked dead and Leola groaned. She should have known.

She heard footsteps to see Emily standing over her, her hand covering her mouth. "Hello Emily." Leola spoke, as if sitting in the hallway, completely covered in soapsuds was a normal thing. "What's up?"

Emily peered into the laundry room and looked back at Leola. "Let me guess, Zack's work?" Leola nodded.

"He was hinting to me earlier that I was losing my touch. I should have been cautious" she grumbled. "No worries. I already have a surprise ready for him when he comes back. He's hanging with Jude"

Emily burst out laughing. "He's going o have a fit."

Leola agreed, giving an evil smile. "That's the point"

Afterwards, she cleaned up the soapy mess by trying to use towels to sort of 'catch' the bubbles and it didn't work. She seriously considered getting the vacuum and sucking up the bubbles and laughed at the mental image. She could see the bubbles going SCCLLOOOOPPPP into the vacuum. BUT she didn't want to risk being electrocuted. In the end she just shut the door and headed for a shower. Hopefully the bubbles would pop and turn into liquid.

Feeling the hot water run down her back, Leola relaxed, allowing the tense aching muscles get the relief they desperately needed. Leola had been working too much, as well as doing jobs and taking on a few hobbies. She barely had enough time to sleep but it was good. Kept her mind away from the leverage team and more importantly away from Eliot. She didn't realize how often she hung out with them, and how attached she'd become to Eliot. But it didn't matter now. Half the time, she was too exhausted when she got home other than eat and fall asleep. She was okay with that.

Rinsing her hair, she turned the water to cold for a minute and shut it off, getting dried and dressed. Walking down stairs, she opened the door so see the bubbles slowly going down. She walked into the living to see what Phil was up to but he was too engrossed in the videogame he was playing. She shrugged her shoulders and walked back into the kitchen.

"Ah nice to see you not covered in bubbles." Emily snickered as she chopped up carrots.

Leola gave her a playful glare and grabbed orange juice from the fridge. "It could have been you. I was thinking about waiting and letting you do it."

Emily snorted. "No you didn't. You were going to do it anyway."

Leola frowned. "Am I that predictable now?"

Emily thought about and spoke, unsure. "I don't really know. Things like the laundry, yes you are but other times...you're a little unpredictable."

Leola grinned. "I'm an enigma. Yay."

Emily giggled, throwing the carrots into the pot. "Mind you, hitting that man over the head with that wooden ball in your purse, no one expected that."

Leola grinned, trying to look innocent. "Why else am I going to carry a wooden ball? Besides I told him to leave and he lunged at me. Self defence."

Emily nodded. Leola got out the green peppers and onions and began chopping them up. The aroma of the vegetables and spice filled the air and she was suddenly reminded of Eliot's cooking but she forced the memories away. He still had yet to call; or anybody to tell the truth. The heat must have been worse than they thought if they were lying low this long.

Emily said something but Leola didn't hear. She came back to earth and saw Emily looking at her concerned.

"What?"

"I asked you what you were doing after. You know you were supposed to leave about twenty minutes ago." Emily said, looking closely at Leola.

Leola just smiled. "Just let me cleaned up the soapy mess in the laundry room and then I will be out of your hair."

Emily chuckled. She had taken on the tricks full force and now became accustomed to being on guard. Leola was happy she found someone that would work there long term.

She cleaned up the soapy mess, managing to dry every surface and planned on getting revenge on Zack. It had been a long time since he pranked her. And now two pranks in one day. She shuddered as she remembered the past when they did everything to drive her crazy.

She threw the load into the washer, first checking it for any pranks and turned it on. She jumped back a few feet and stared at the washer, daring it to start sprouting wings and blowing soap. It did none of the sort and Leola felt quite satisfied with herself. She gave the washer a curt nod before walking out.

* * *

Eliot knew what he was doing, he had trained for this. This was why they called him a hitter; it wasn't because of his moody disposition. This was the tap out job after all. The fact that Eliot even had to argue about taking the dive in the fight was the right move, people's lives were at stake and if there was something Eliot could do to fix that, he had to. The team agreed reluctantly, allowing Eliot to do things his way. He headed to the gym after everyone piled out and began practicing jabs and mentally preparing himself.

Sophie walked in, seeing Eliot practice in the ring. Walking over she spoke. "Hey, listen you don't have to do this you know. Nate's gonna come up with something."

Eliot stopped and turned to her, giving her a little smile. "I'm losing a fight Sophie. I'm not diving on a grenade." He threw a couple jabs at invisible opponents. "I'll be all right."

Sophie nodded but frowned. There was alot she didn't understand about the sport but she wondered about Eliot's take on the fight. "Yeah, I know. I'm not talking physically."

"I think my ego can take it." came his reply.

"Look you told me that it's about control. Knowing that you're never going to be the victim...that's what keeps you going right?"

Eliot stopped and walked over to where Sophie was standing at the side of the ring and leaned against the ropes. "You think I'm upset 'cause I got to let this guy kick my ass?" he looked away for a moment before returning his gaze to Sophie's. "I learned a long time ago, you can't control the violence and I can take the punishment." He gave her a half nod. "Its what I do. What I need to control is not out there." he patted his chest, his eyes flickering. "Its here. Always."

Sophie smiled, beginning to understand. She looked up at Eliot, and walked out, feeling a little better about the fight.

Eliot however, had things to contemplate. The team has been back together for about three weeks...and he had yet to go see Leola. She was deeply hurt by his decision and he regretted it every day. Leaning against the ropes and looking around the place, he pulled out a picture he had taken with her. They were sitting in her bed his arms wrapped around her pulling her close to him. He was smiling at the camera but she was looking up at him. There was so much love in their eyes that day that he had almost told her that he loved her. He kept eyes on the picture as thoughts took off and questions came to mind. Did she move on? Was she still mad? Did she have a boyfriend? Would she want to be with him after what he had put her through? Guilt brewed inside him and he almost wished she wouldn't. That would be his punishment. Then again he loved her and never felt that way before. He wanted to be with her. In spur of the moment, powered by his conversation with Sophie and the thought he belonged with her, he pulled his cell out of his pocket, wiping his sweaty hair out of his face, dialling Leola's number. Adrenaline pumped through him and he didn't know what to expect.

She picked up after the third ring. "_"hello? Leola Givens here." _Eliot couldn't speak; having no idea what he was thinking. "_hello? Maybe we have a bad connection. Want me to call back? Hello? I'm gonna hang up..." _she sounded amused.

""hey." Eliot sounded nervous and he walked around the ring, wondering what else to say. It was Leola's turn to not be able to speak. "It's Leola. I mean Eliot. Its Eliot here. Of course where else would I be but you can't see where I am...Hey...Leola." he blew out a gust of air. This was getting him pretty riled up.

"_Eliot?" _came a soft whisper.

"Um. Uh, I gotta uh call you back." he stammered, a little more than flustered. He pressed end, angry with himself. The first time he speaks to her and he sounded like a bumbling idiot. Muttering a curse under his breath, he decided to go over to her apartment after the fight was over. See what her decision was.

He did some footwork before throwing two jabs and a punch at his invisible opponents, finishing with a kick.

**Hope you liked it! Please review; I'd love to hear from you. :) AND HE CALLED! :O **


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